Rensselaer Republican, Volume 14, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 June 1882 — The Market Price of Elephants by Admeasurement. [ARTICLE]

The Market Price of Elephants by Admeasurement.

The Moors, who drive a trade in elephants throughout the Indies, have a fixed price for the ordinary type, according to their size. To ascertain their true value they measure from the nail of the fore foot to the top of the shoulder, and for every cubit high they give at the rate of £IOO of our money. An African elephant of the largest size measures about 9 cubits, or 13)4 reet in height, and is worth about £900; but for the huge elephants of the Island of Ceylon, four times that sum is given. Had Jumbo been measured by the same standard, what would have been his real value in money ? Colonel R. W. Holland showed us yesterday the most remarkable walking cane we ever saw. It was made by a young man in Missouri, from a limb cut from a tree in the Colonel’s orchard, at his old homestead .there. Upon it are carved an alligator, the Bible, a gavel, plumb, mallet, cable-tow, three st.ps, bee hive, trowel, hour-glass, star and scythe, coffin and evergreen, heart, spade and mallet, anchor and cable, sword, ark, bear,kangaroo, head of bulldog, turtle, a fish, hog, crane, owl, gar-fish, dog, rattlesnake, and scroll with the Colonel’s name engraved thereon.