Chap. I.J 
CEYLOJS" ELK. 
o9 
present to Her Majesty, but it was unfortunately killed 
by an accident. 1 
Ceylon Elk. — In the mountains, the Ceylon elk 2 , 
which reminds one of the red deer of Scotland, attains 
the height of four or five feet ; it abounds in all shady 
places that are intersected by rivers ; where, though its 
chase affords an endless resource to the sportsman, its 
venison scarcely equals in quality the inferior beef of the 
lowland ox. In the glades and park-like openings that 
diversify the great forests of the interior, the spotted 
Axis troops in herds as numerous as the fallow deer in 
England; but, in journeys through the jungle, when 
often dependent on the guns of our party for the pre- 
carious supply of the table, we found the flesh of the 
Axis 3 and the Muntjac 4 a sorry substitute for that of the 
pea-fowl, the jungle-cock, and flamingo. The occurrence 
of albinos is very frequent in troops of the axis. Deer's 
horns are an article of export from Ceylon, and consider- 
able quantities are annually sent to the United Kingdom. 
VII. Pachydekmata. — The Elephant. — The elephant 
and the wild boar, the Singhalese "waloora," 5 are the 
only representatives of the "pachydermatous order. The 
latter, which differs somewhat from the wild boar of 
1 When the English took posses- stance occurred during my resi- 
sion of Kandy, in 1803, they found dence in Ceylon, in which Wo 
"five beautiful milk-white deer in natives, whose mimicry had mu- 
the palace, which was noted as a tually deceived them, crept so close 
very extraordinary thing." — Let- together in the jungle that one shot 
ter in Appendix to Percival's the other, supposing the cry to 
Ceylon, p. 428. The writer does proceed from the game. 
not say of what species they were. 3 Axis maculata, H. Smith, 
2 Rusa Aristotelis. Dr. Cray 4 Stylocerus muntjac, Horsf. 
has lately shown that this is the 5 Mr. Blyth of Calcutta has 
great axis of Cuvier. — Oss. Foss. distinguished, from the hog, com- 
502, t. 39, f. 10. The Singhalese, mon in India, a specimen sent to 
on following the elk, frequently him from Ceylon, the skull of which 
effect their approaches by so imi- approaches in form, that of a spe- 
tating the call of the animal as to cies from Borneo, the sus barbatus of 
induce them to respond. An in- S. Miiller. 
