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The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 2 (of 6)

Note 1576 — BOOK VIII. THE NATURE OF THE TERRESTRIAL ANIMALS.

John Bostock translation

Cuvier remarks, that there are two kinds of elephants, one of which attains sixteen feet, and is chiefly known in Cochin China and Tonquin, while those that are domesticated in India are seldom more than half that height. They are supposed, however, to be only varieties of the same species. Pliny, in B. vi. c. 22, gives an account of the uses which the Indians made of the elephant, and of their different sizes, but he does not state there that it is the smaller ones only that are employed in agriculture.—B.

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