d world will soon be brought under the same
civilizing influences, the nomadic tribes reduced to a stationary habit
of life, and the commerce effected in the modern manner. When this
change is brought about, this old-time animal, which but for the care of
man would have probably long since passed away, will be likely, save
so far as it may be preserved through motives of scientific interest, to
join the great array of vanished species.

[Illustration: Camels along the Sea at Twilight]

It affords a pleasant contrast to turn from the consideration of the
camels to a study of the elephants. The difference in the measure of
attractiveness of the two forms is very great, and depends upon facts of
remarkable interest. Unlike the camel--which, as we have seen, is the
last survivor of an ancient lineage, represented by but two species, and
these limited to a small part of the world--the elephant, at the time
when man appears to have taken shape, seems to have existed on all the
continental lands except Australia, and to have been in a state of
singular prosperity. As is often the case with other vigorous genera of
mammals, the species were adapted to a very great variety of climates,
and were fitted to endure tropic heat as well as arctic cold.

The group of elephants is first known to us in the early part of
Tertiary time. From its first appearance on our stage it seems to have
been successful in a high measure, and this probably by reason of its
possession of the remarkable invention of the trunk--a prolonged and
marvellously flexible nose which serves in the manner of an arm and
hand for gathering food.

When we first find traces of mankind in the records of the rocks, in
what appears to be an age just anterior to the Glacial epoch, the
elephant had passed the experimental stages of its development and
was firmly established as the king of beasts. In his adult form he
had nothing to fear from any of the lower animals, and by the
organization of herds it is probable that even the young were
tolerably safe from assault. Until the early races of men had attained
a considerable skill in the use of weapons, the great beasts were
probably safe from human attack. We may well believe that primitive
savages shunned them as unconquerable. As early, perhaps, as the
closing stages of the Glacial epoch in Europe, we find evidences which
pretty clearly show that the folk of that land, probably belonging to
some race other than our ow