AGE OF ANIMALS.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXXI, Issue LXII, 16 May 1912, Page 6

AGE OF ANIMALS.

Undoubtedly the longest lived animal on earth (or the sea) is the whale, it 3 span of existence being estimated by Cuvier at 1000 years. So writes Mr Emmett Campbell Hall, in "Our Dumb Animals." The next largest animal, the elephant, will, under favorable conditions, live 400 years. AVhen Alexander the Great -conquered Pcrus, King of India, he 'took a great elephant that had fought gallantly for the defeated king, named him Ajax, dedicated him to the "sun, placed upon him a metal band with the inscription, "Alexander, the son of Jupiter, dedicated Ajax to the sun." The elephant was foundj alive, three hundred and fifty years later. The average age of cats is fifteen years; of squirrels seven or eight years; of rabbits, seven; a bear rarely exceeds twenty years; a wolf, twenty; a fox, fourteen to sixteen. Lions are comparatively longlived, instances having been recorded where they reached the age of seventy years. Pigs have been known to live to the age of twenty years, and horses to sixty, but the average age of the horse is twenty-five to thirty. Camels sometimes live to the age of 100, and stags are very long-lived. Eagles occasionally, and ravens frequently, reach the age of 100 years, and swans have been known to live 300 years. A tortoise has been known to live 107 years.