Chap. VI.] 



CONDUCT IN CAPTIVITY. 



391 



manifested much attachment. The child was sent for ; 

 and on its arrival the elephant, as anticipated, evinced 

 extreme satisfaction, and was managed with ease, till by 

 deo-rees he became reconciled to the presence of a new 

 superintendent. 



It has been said that the mahouts die young, owing 

 to some supposed injury to the spinal column from the 

 pecuhar motion of the elephant ; but such a remark does 

 not apply to those in Ceylon, who are healthy, and as 

 long lived as others. If the motion of the elephant be 

 thus injurious, that of the camel must be still more so ; 

 yet we never hear of early death ascribed to tlus cause 

 by the Arabs. 



The voice of the keeper, with a very hmited vocabulary 

 of articulate sounds, serves almost alone to guide the 

 elephant in his domestic occupations.^ Sir Eveeard 

 Home, from an examination of the muscular fibres in the 

 drum of an elephant's ear, came to the conclusion, that 

 notwithstanding the distinctness and power of his per- 

 ception of sounds at a greater distance than other animals, 

 he was insensible to then" harmonious modulation and 

 destitute of a musical ear.^ But Professor Harrison, in a 



^ The principal sound by which 

 the mahouts in Ceylou direct the 

 motions of the elephants is a repeti- 

 tion, with various modulations, of 

 the words ur-7'e .' ur-re ! This is one 

 of those interjections in which the 

 soimd is so expressive of the sense 

 that persons in charge of animals of 

 almost eveiy description throughout 

 the world appear to have adopted it 

 with a concuiTence that is verv curi- 

 ous. The camel drivers in Turkey, 

 Palestine, and Egyi^t encourage them 

 to speed by shouting ar-re ! ar-rc ! 

 The Arabs in Algeria ciy eirich ! to 

 their mules. The Moors seem to 

 have carried the custom with them 

 into Spain, where nudes are still 

 driven with cries oiarre (whence the 

 niideteers derive their Spanish ap- 



pellation of " arrieros"). In Franco 

 the sportsman excites the hound by 

 shouts of hare ! hare ! and the wag- 

 goner there turns his horses by bis 

 voice, and the use of the word hur- 

 hardl In the North, " //«;vs was_a 

 word used by the old Germans in 

 urging their horses to speed ;" and 

 to the present day, the herdsmen in 

 Ireland, and parts of Scotland, drive 

 their pigs with shouts of hurrish I 

 hnrrish ! closely resembling that used 

 by the mahouts in Ceylon. 



^ On the Difference hetween the 

 Human 3Iemhrana Tipnpani and 

 that of the Elephant. By Sir EvE- 

 rardIIome, Bart, Philos. Trans. 

 1823. Paper by Prof. Harrison, 

 Proc. Ro} al Irish Academy, vol. iii. 

 p. o8G. 



c c 4 



