Elephant Shooting. 87 



knowledge of surveying and engineering, having been 

 educated at a military school, I was transferred very 

 soon to the Public Works Department, so remained 

 in Burma thirteen years, and have never visited Mercara 

 in my life, and Coimbatore only once. So much for 

 my youthful reminiscences. 



I may here make some remarks on that most useful 

 animal the elephant. 



In wilds far away from cultivation, elephants lead a 

 roaming life and do little or no harm. They consume 

 so much and waste so much more, that no single forest 

 could support them ; hence their roving propensities. 

 In Burma during the rains, they come down, from the 

 sparsely inhabited districts in herds, take up their 

 abode in some adjacent jungle to cultivation, and de- 

 stroy immense quantities of paddy and any other grain 

 they find. After the harvest they retire to their 

 fastnesses amidst the vast forests or into ranges of 

 mountains where they find plenty of sustenance and 

 are seldom molested. 



A female elephant has only one at a birth, and she 

 goes two years in gestation. An elephant's life and 

 that of a man's are of much the same duration and 

 both arrive at maturity at the same time. We have 

 had our centenarians and elephants doubtless have had 

 theirs. We hear tales of their having lived over 150 

 years they say Parr did the same but I believe my- 

 self that at 100 an elephant would be as decrepit as a 

 man of the same age. McMaster, a well-known 

 sportsman and naturalist, who has now joined the 

 majority, writes of these noble beasts : " Those who 

 only think of elephants as they have seen these 

 domestic giants working at any of the innumerable 





