198 Correspondence. [No. 2, 



Why should the Elephant of Borneo have heen introduced by 

 human agency, any more than the Rhinoceros sondaictts, or the 

 Bos sondaicus ; which latter would appear to be remarkably numer- 

 ous on the vast island ? 



I have been assured that there is no notice of the Rhinoceros in 

 the early Sanscrit writings ; but then the river Ganges is mentioned 

 onpe only in the whole course of the Vedas. Questioning Mr. E. B. 

 Cowell on the subject, he obligingly writes word — " There are at 

 least two Sanscrit words for Rhinoceros, Khadga or Khadgin (Khad- 

 ga properly means c a sword' — then the horn, and lastly the animal, 

 — Khadgin means the ' sword-bearer,') and Gandaha Uganda pro- 

 perly means 'a cheek'). Both words are found in the Amara Kosha 

 dictionary about 56 B. C, and the words Khadgin and Khadga 

 occur in the Mahdbharata and Ramayana. The Hindustani word is 

 Oaindd ; and I suspect Baber used this term, as all our Indo- 

 Persian writers use Hindustani terms pretty freely. There is, how- 

 ever, a good Persian word for it, Karkadan ; and I find in Richard- 

 son's dictionary a new fact in Natural History which I doubt if even 

 you have found out. I transcribe his whole account. 



" ' The horn of this animal, it is said, sweats on the approach of 

 any species of poison, for which reason many Eastern princes make 

 use of it constantly at table ; when split through the middle there is 

 the resemblance of a man represented by white lines, together with 

 the figures of several birds.' 



" There are several Arabic names for the Rhinoceros, as Mirmis, 

 Uirmis, Karlcaddan ; but these names tell nothing." The Arabs, 

 however, most probably obtained their knowledge of the genus from 

 one or more of the African species. Gondii is the name applied in 

 Bengal (misspelt Gomdd in Parsons's paper in the Phil. Trans.), 

 passing into Gorrd in Upper Hindustan : Kyen or Kyeng is the 

 Burmese name ; and Badak or BodoJc the Malayan. Gondd has at 

 least the merit of brevity over Rhinoceros, and is quite as euphonous. 



With respect to the history of the skeleton of Rh. sondaicus in 

 the Society's museum, vide J. A. S. Ill, 142, IX, 518, X, 928. The 



mentioned by him by its name of Kijang. So familiar a bird (in museums at 

 least) as a Trogon, he does not know by that name, but terms it the ' Omen- 

 bird' (II, 62, 67, 95) ; and the remarkable wild Boar of Borneo (Sus BABBATUS) 

 he fails to recognise as a peculiar species. The Bos SONDAlCTJs would appear to 

 be very common in the part of Borneo traversed by Mr. St. John, and he desig- 

 nates it by the name Tambadau. 



