t;A]PTtrRE OF ELEPHANTS. 109 



sides, and with drums, guns, shouts, and flambeaux, force the 

 terrified animals to enter the fatal enclosure, when the passage 

 is barred behind them, and retreat rendered impossible. Their 

 efforts to escape are repressed by the crowd, who drive them 

 back from the stockade with spears and flaming torches j and 

 at last compel them to pass on into the second enclosure. 

 Here they are detained for a short time, and their feverish' ex- 

 haustion relieved by free access to water— until at last, being 

 tempted by food, or otherwise induced, to trust themselves in 

 the narrow outlet, they are -one after another made fast by ropes, 

 passed in through the palisade, and picketed in the adjoining 

 woods to enter on their course of systematic training. These 

 arrangements vary in different <listricts of Bengal; and the 

 method adopted in Ceylon differs in many essential particular 

 from them ail 5 tha keddah, or, as it is here called, the corral or 

 torahl (from the Portuguese curral, a ^^ cattle-pen,") consists 

 of but one enclosure instead of three. A stream or watering 

 place is not uniformly enclosed within it, because, although wa- 

 ter is indispensable after the long thirst and exhaustion of the 

 captives, it has been found that a pond or rivulet within the 

 corral itself adds to the difficulty of leading them out, and in- 

 creases their reluctance to leave it 5 besides which, the smaller 

 €nes ai'e often smothered by the others in their ei^gerness to 

 crowd into the water. The funnel-shaped outlet is also dis- 

 pensed with, as the animals are liable to bruise and injure them- 

 selves within the narrow stockade ; and should one of them die 

 in it, as is too often the case in the midst of the struggle, the 

 difficulty of removing so great a carcass is extreme. The 

 noosing and securing them, therefore, takes place in Ceylon 

 within the area of the first enclosure into which they enter, and 

 the dexterity and daring displayed in this portion of the work 

 far surpasses that of merely attaching the rope through the 

 openings of the paling, as in an Indian keddah, and affords a 

 much more exciting sport. 



In Ceylon, in former times, the work connected with these 

 hunts was performed by forced labor extorted from the natives 

 by their sovereigns as a part of the feudal service termed "raja- 

 kariya," and this labor was in succession demanded by the Por- 

 tuguese, Dutch and English, as the island passed successively 

 into their possession. Since the abolition of this compul- 

 sory duty, there has been no difficulty in securing all required 

 assistance voluntarily. From fifteen hundred to two thousand 

 men are required to construct the corral, drive in the elephants, 

 maintain the cordon of watch-fires and watchers, and attend to 

 other duties. Many weeks are occupied in putting up the 



