NO. 49.— 1898.] THE CEYLON ELEPHANT. 



177 



oome within my observation by remarking, in the first 

 place, that it is sufficiently acknowledged and known to all 

 the world that the elephants are the largest quadrupeds 

 known to man, being by some held to be the largest of all 

 animals. But if there be any hesitation to accept this as 

 true however, although in point of artfulness and natural 

 cunning the elephants do not come up to other wild beasts, 

 such as foxes, monkeys, &c, yet that the elephants are exceed- 

 ingly docile are found by many living and clear proofs, for 

 they are used by many Indian potentates and princes, not 

 only for purposes of ceremonial and show, but also in war, to 

 injure the enemy by means of heavy long iron chains, which 

 they swing about so lustily with their trunks that many are 

 knocked down and killed thereby. 



Elephants are also kept and used in the courts of many 

 Indian kings and princes only to show their power and 

 majesty to foreigners and their own subjects; for they 

 seem to place and set in this a special honour and glory, 

 the elephants being, in the Court of the Emperor of Ceylon 

 or King of Kandy, on the arrival or departure of any 

 ambassadors, drawn up in a double circle, as is customary 

 in the army before princes and exalted personages, without 

 in any way seeking by this comparison to show any similarity 

 the one to the other. 



These elephants in Kandy were not only kept and used 

 for show and honour, but also as executioners, 2 to put to 

 death criminals, for those guilty of treason or other serious, 

 nay even trivial, offences were thrown before the elephants, 

 who in no time tear and crush these unfortunate men with 

 their tusks and feet, and sometimes seizing them in the 

 middle with their trunks they throw them up perpendi- 

 cularly, catch them with their tusks, and then kill them — a 

 fearful and horrible sight, fit to deter all onlookers from 

 all evil designs. These aforesaid elephants are specially 

 taught and instructed in this, being quick and dexterous in 

 this business of carrying out the wishes and orders of their 

 masters. 



