Here is a little known fact about elephants, which I am sure will interest our young readers.

An elephant cannot take all four feet off the ground at once. In other words, it cannot jump a ditch which a horse or even a big dog can cross.

It cannot turn its head around like the average animal because its neck is too short. So if it wants to see what is going on behind it, has to turn its whole body around. This makes it nervous of being suddenly approached from behind.

With the exception of the whale, it is the finest swimmer of all the mammals.

It has such a thin skin that it suffers torments from the bites of insects. For this reason it flings, with the aid of its trunk, dust and mud over itself, whenever possible.

Its sight is not very good, but its power of scent is enormous. It can scent a man or a tiger up to a distance of over two miles.