CHAP. I.] OXEN. 153 



as the calves are always permitted to suck them, 

 milk is an article which the traveller can rarely hope 

 to procure in a Kandyan village. From their con- 

 stant exposure at all seasons, the cattle in Ceylon, 

 both those employed in agriculture and on the roads, 

 are subject to devastating murrains, that sweep them 

 away by thousands. So frequent is the recurrence 

 of these calamities, and so extended their ravages, 

 that they exercise a serious influence over the com- 

 mercial interests of the colony, by reducing the 

 facilities of agriculture, and augmenting the cost of 

 carriage during the most critical periods of the coffee 

 harvest. 



A similar disorder, probably peripneumonia, fre- 

 quently carries off" the cattle in Assam and other hill 

 countries on the continent of India; and there, as in 

 Ceylon, the inflammatory symptoms in the lungs and 

 throat, and the internal derangement and external 

 eruptive appearances, seem to indicate that the disease 

 is a feverish influenza, attributable to neglect and ex- 

 posure in a moist and variable climate; and that its 

 prevention might be hoped for, and the cattle preserved, 

 by the simple expedient of more humane and conside- 

 rate treatment, especially by affording them cover at 

 night. 



During my residence in Ceylon an incident occurred 

 at Neuera-ellia, which invested one of these pretty 

 animals with an heroic interest. A little cow, belong- 

 ing to an English gentleman, was housed, together with 

 her calf, near the dwelling of her owner, and being 

 aroused during the night by her furious bellowing, the 

 servants, on hastening to the stall, found her goring a 

 leopard, which had stolen in to attack the calf. She 

 had got him into a corner, and whilst lowing incessantly 

 to call for help, she continued to pound him with her 

 horns. The wild animal, apparently stupified by her 

 unexpected violence, was detained by her till despatched 

 by a gun. 



