ELEPHANTS 287 



one who has vanquished his rivals. But as years pass, 

 and the younger elephants grow up, by one or other 

 of them the supremacy of the leader is disputed. A 

 combat ensues. The vanquished elephant, whichever 

 he may be, is then expelled the herd. Condemned 

 to solitude, he becomes vicious, and is dangerous to 

 men as well as to his own species. This is the accepted 

 explanation; how far it is founded on actual observation 

 I cannot say. 



But among the solitary elephants there are some who 

 have not been expelled from a herd. These are tame 

 elephants that have escaped and taken to the forest, and 

 these, it is said, are among the most dangerous of all. 

 Their viciousness is attributed to much the same cause. 

 The wild elephants will not associate with them, and 

 so, like the expelled elephants, they are condemned to 

 solitude. The native explanation for this is, that, 

 having been in captivity and in association with man, 

 they have from their changed food and mode of life 

 acquired an order which the wild elephants dislike, 

 or which marks them as of a different species. It is 

 more probable, I think, that the wild elephants recognize 

 them as not belonging to their own herd. 



The elephants in these forests are not considered to 

 be so large and fine as the elephants of the forests far 

 away to the east towards Assam, nor are they nearly so 

 numerous. On these accounts they are but rarely 

 captured, and then only in pits, or, as they are termed, 

 " ogees." The " ogee " in shape much resembles a saw- 

 pit, only it is very much longer and broader, and also 

 slightly deeper. It is dug in the course of some track 



