1862.] Correspondence. 197 



the wounded Elephant. He often finds him, so weakened by loss of 

 blood as to be unable to keep up with the rest of the herd, and a 

 new wound is soon inflicted. Patiently pursuing this practice, the 

 hunter has secured many of these princes of the forest." 



In another place (I, 396), but again with reference to the valley 

 of the Kina Batangan river, Mr. St. John remarks — " As this is the 

 only country in Borneo where the Elephants are numerous, it is the 

 only one where ivory forms an important article of trade in the eyes 

 of the natives." 



Now, I am well aware of Mr. Darwin's calculation as to what the 

 accumulated progeny of one pair of slow-breeding Elephants might 

 amount to, in the course of five centuries, supposing that naught 

 happened to check their increase in the geometrical ratio ; but I 

 doubt exceedingly that, in the instance under consideration, the 

 existing great herds of Elephants in the N. E. peninsula of Borneo 

 have descended from some two or three individuals put ashore by the 

 order of the Sultan of Sulu, a little more than a century ago ; con- 

 tinually decimated, too, as these Elephants would seem to have been 

 and are at this time : and I doubt it all the more, because it appears 

 that wild herds of Elephants existed until recently in Sulu ! Why, 

 therefore, should the few tame Elephants presented to the Sultan of 

 Sulu be landed in Borneo ? The remnant of the wild race existed 

 in Sulu within the memory of people now living ! On this subject, 

 Mr. St. John fortunately helps us with information. In his notice 

 of Sulu, he remarks (II, 243), — " Bemembering Eorest's statement 

 that Elephants were found in his time in the forests which clothed 

 so much of the soil of the island, I asked Dater Daniel about it ; 

 his answer was, that even within the remembrance of the oldest men 

 then alive, there were still a few Elephants left in the woods, but 

 that, finding they committed so much damage to the plantations, the 

 villagers had combined and hunted the beasts till they were all 

 killed : I was pleased to find the old traveller's account confirmed." 

 II, 243 * 



* Unfortunately, Mr. St. John is no naturalist. The little c Mouse Deer' he 

 calls the ' Moose Deer' (II, 52), like some of our countrymen in Ceylon ; thus 

 confounding the very smallest of the Deer tribe with the very largest ; and the 

 tiny animal of the tropics with the giant of northern regions ! Of his two 

 kinds of horned Deer (I, 33), I take the Rusa Balum to be the Javanese Rusa, 

 and the Ilnsa Lalang to mean the Muntjac. The latter, however, is elsewhere 



