Dayton daily empire. [volume] (Dayton [Ohio]) 1850-1865, 1860-08-02
About Ivory.
Irrom tho \. '. Journal commorcc.l

From tic n Y. Journal Commcrcc
While we assocnte ivory and Indin togeth
or, but very little of tho former comes from
the latter. II is estimated that to supply ivory
to the British market for the last few years it
has required about 900, 900 pounds annually;
of this quantity Ceylon-tho great elephant
park of lndia-furnishe only 800 or 600 lbs.
The ivory which is put down in the printed
reports OF sales at Bombay" IN nine cases
out of ten is shipped by Mahamedau mer-
chants from the east coast of Africa TO the
large Northwestern commercial emporium of
Bombay. We do not mean, however, TO as
sort that no elephants tusks como from Asia
for occasionally there will be small lots from
Ceylon and Sumatra. There is also large
ivory trade between Zanzibar and China via
Bombay A great deal Of ivory, we may state,
by the way, now reaches the United States di-
recty from Africa.
The immense demand for elephants teeth,
has Of late years increased the supply from all
parts Of Aliicn At the end Of the last century,
the annual average importation into England
was only 92500 pounds in 1867 IL reached
1864, ,7sl pounds, ORG ,0S0 tusks, which wouldre-
qure the death of at least 3, 040 male elephants.
1t is probable that the slaughteris much great
er for the teeth of the female elephant are very
small, and Burchell tells u.s. in his African
travels that he met with some elephant hun
ters who had shot twelve huge fellows, which
however, altogether produced no more than
200 lbs of ivory. To produce 100000 lbs,
Of ivory, the present annual English import,
we should require (estimating each tusk Mt GO
pounds) the life Of y 1888 male elephants. II
Is said that 1000 tuskers suffer death every
year to supply the United States with combs,
knife handles billiard balls, etc
A tusk weighing seventy pounds and up
wards is considered by dealers n FIRST class,
Cuvier formed a table of the most remarkable
tusks Of which any account has been given,
The largest on record was one which WIS sold
at Amsterdam, which weighed three hundred
and fifty pounds In the late sales at Lon
don the lnrgest of the Bombay and Zanzibar
was ~ lbs of angola and Lisbon go lbs
of Cape of Good Hope and Natal LOG lbs; oI
Cape Coast Castle, Lagos" Nc, ia lbs; oI
"Gaboon," 81 lbs, Egyptian" IA lbs But
it must not be inferred from this that large
tusks are now rare. On the contrary IL il
probable that more long and heavy teeth are
now brought TO market than in any previous
century A short time ago Julius Pratt n Co
cut up, at their establishment in Meriden, CT
a tusk that was nine and o half feet long, eight
inches in diameter and which weighed nearly
two hundred pounds The same firm in 1851
sent TO the Worlds Fair London, the widest
finest, and hrgest pieces of ivory ever sawed
out BY wonderful machinery, invented
in their own factory, they sawed out (ant
the process OF saving did the work Of pol
ishing at the same time) strip of ivory for
ly one feet long and twelve inches wide, /
took the precedence Of the specimens sent II
| by England, France or Germany and received
rowarding attention from the Commission. l
may be asked what can be done with such al
| immense piece of ivoryY We reply that tn
timo has come when this beautiful matcria
can be used for purposes Of yeneerng, AM
we shall soon doubtless see, tables, bureaus
writing desks, and other members OF the iui
niture family rendered AZ resplendent as tn
throne Of solomon, We believe that tits no'
contemplated by Steinway 4 Sons, to build
piano whose keys shall not be the only portio
from the teeth Of the African elephant, but a
instrument whose whole surface shall be Q
FURNISHED virgin ivory One thing is certa
that any pianoforte manufacturer who woul
first attempt this will make q sensation by III
novelty Of this affair, and will doubtless b
well rewarded for his labor.
The most costly tusks, or portions Of III
tusks, are those which are used for billiar
balls. What are termed "cut point" of ju,
the right size for billiard balls, from 2 4 TO 2
inches in diameter brought the highest pric
4 (ej3) per cut Of any ivory offered in the Lor
don market at the late sales Billiard ba
making has of late becsme II very importar
item Of manufacture in this country
The teeth from the West Coast with the e,
eeption Of "Gaboon,' nre less elastic, and lei
| - hat