36 WILD SPORTS OF BURMA AND ASSAM 



for the hunter to distinguish them from surrounding objects ; 

 while their feet are so made, that not only can they trample 

 over any kind of ground, whether hard or soft, thorny or 

 smooth, but without emitting a sound. Some of their en- 

 camping grounds are models of ingenuity, surrounded on 

 three sides by a tortuous river, impassable for ordinary 

 mortals by reason either of the depth of water, its precipitate 

 banks, quicksands, or entangling weeds in its beds, whilst the 

 fourth side would be protected by a tangled thicket or quag- 

 mire. In such a place (as I have found them in) the elephants 

 are in perfect safety, as it is impossible to get at them without 

 making sufficient noise to put them on the alert. Their 

 mode of getting within such an enclosure is also most ingeni- 

 ous. They will scramble down the bank where the water is 

 deepest, and then, either wading or swimming up or down 

 stream, ascend the opposite bank a good half-mile or more 

 from the place they descended, thereby increasing the difficulty 

 of following them. I was over an hour once endeavouring 

 to get into such a fastness as I have attempted to describe, 

 in which some twenty or more elephants were assembled, 

 within a space nowhere more than four hundred yards square, 

 but so well were all the approaches protected, that when at 

 last I did succeed in getting over the preliminary difficulties, 

 the noise we made was sufficient to have awakened the seven 

 sleepers, to say nothing of disturbing a herd of elephants 

 always more or less on the qui vive, that I had the pleasure 

 of seeing them make their exit one way as I entered that on 

 the opposite, and I never even got a shot, for such was the 

 intricate nature of the country, it was useless indeed all but 

 impossible to follow them with any chance of getting within 

 range. They prefer forests by day and open ground by night, 

 and feed on bamboos, wild cardamam, plantains, null, branches 

 of certain trees, the ficus preferred, or long grass, which is 

 abundant in all the plains ; but if there be any cultivation 

 within reach of their stronghold they will go for it and do 

 more harm by trampling it down than by devouring it, which 

 is not inconsiderable either. It is marvellous too how they 

 remember the seasons when certain fruits are ripe. I have 

 noticed this more in Africa than in India, but it is true of 



