Note 109 — Chapter IV · ANIMAL-WORSHIP.

From these all the modern elephants are descended. As Abul Fazl writes: “When occasion arises people read incantations in their names and address them in worship. They also think that every elephant in the world is offspring of one of them. Thus, elephants of a white skin and white hairs are related to the first, and elephants with a large head and long ears, of a fierce and bold temper, and eyelids far apart, belong to the second. Such as are good-looking, black, and high in the back, are the offspring of the third. If tall, ungovernable, quick in understanding, short-haired, and with red and black eyes, they come from the fourth. If bright black, with one tusk longer than the other, with a white breast and belly, and long and thick forefeet, from the fifth. If fearful, with prominent veins, a short hump and ears, and a long trunk, from the sixth. If thin-bellied, red-eyed, and with a long trunk, from the seventh. And if of a combination of the preceding seven qualities, from the eighth.”109