The Mason County journal. [volume] (Shelton, W.T.) 1886-1927, 1889-11-01
NATURAL HISTORY,
Two Lessons For Inquisitive Small Boys
and Curious Little Girls.
THE Elephant

4 w Acs>ons InQufSltEve small bOyo
and Curious Little Girls.
THE ELEPHANT
The elephant could have been made
great deal larger. but he was sawed
IF and trimmed up to present size for
The convenience of circus men in get
hing him around the country. There
was no intention OF making him beau
tiful or ornamental, Ms he would then
have come in competition with tobog-
gan slides and haystacks.
In his native state the elephant does
more or less gambling and doesn't
bank much on dignity. When in cap
tivity his principal occupation is work
ing his ears and reaching for apples
and confectionery, and he feels every
pound of his Importance He doesn't
kill man or upset menagerie wagon
every day in the year without break,
but he INDUCES himself Otter enough
to keep the rust rubbed off his trunk.
Elephants are supposed to live five
hundred years If no one puts rough on
rats in their biscuit or croton oil in
their ice cream Their object in living
six times as long as a man has never
been ascertained and is much won
dered at They have an excellent
memory for faces, times and places,
and the boy who feeds an elephant TO-
bacco in Syracuse to-day may get
knocked out in New Orleans fifty years
hence
THE CAMEL
AT first sight it would seem as if the
camel had been manufactured from the
scraps left over after all other beasts
had been created, but such is far from
being the case. He was made as a
companion for the sand-bar and the
cactus plant. and to live in and en-
liven a section of country which even
the buZzards refuse to fly over. He
was therefore made after certain plans
and specifications, and he fills the bill
as nothing else could There is but
little to drink in the camel country.
and that only secOnd-class water, and
the beast was therefore provided with
two stOmachs-one to act as receiv-
ing basin and cleanse the water of
sand-bars, brickbats. mud turtles and
other foreign substances. AMI the other
as reservoir to hold weeks supply.
A. camel has been known to 60 thirteen
days without drink after his reser-
yoir was full. but that was rather i'm
posing on good nature
Nature probably intended all camels
to have two humps. but there wasn't
hump-backed material enough to 60
around. or one of them somehow got
lost The object of the double
hump is two-fold. One was to
hold a saddle in place, and the
other was to store up fat against
call. When he can find nothing to
eat he draws on these humps, and his
drafts are always honored. While
hard on the humps it is a good thing
for their owner, and the economic
Arab only wishes that his camels had
been all humps and stomachs. Those
who have made voyage on a camel's
back have thereafter been perfectly
satisfied that there is nothing like it
on earth The motion is sort of cross
between falling down the cellar stairs
and being picked up by cyclone. but
no one should blame the camel for it
1t wasn't his fault that he was not
born canal boat or a gondola-
In one respect the camel is like a
newspaper editor-he is patient and
long suffering and he will not turn I'M
til the limit has been reached Then
look out! If left to take care of him
self the camel would live sixty or sew
anty years. but when carted around
with circus he gets tired of life at
about thirty, and is found dead in bed
some morning with sad smile on his
countenance.
The one-hump camel is sort of one
horse beast, understood and looked
upon with the same distrust that is felt
coward the average alderman. There
IS never day that he doesn't feel that
he ought to have been born a whale or
some other handsome and useful ami
NAL, and his span of life is reduced
one-half in consequence.-Det Free
Press.