Chap. II.] THE ELEPHANT. 



87 



abling it to swing the hind feet forward close to the 

 ground, assists it to toss the body alternately from foot 

 to foot, till deprived of life. 1 



A sportsman who had partially undergone this opera- 

 tion, having been seized by a wounded elephant but 

 rescued from its fury, described to me his sufferings as 

 he was thus flung back and forward between the hind 

 and fore feet of the animal, which ineffectually at- 

 tempted to trample him at each concussion, and aban- 

 doned him without inflicting serious injury. 



Knox, in describing the execution of criminals by the 

 state elephants of the former kings of Kandy, says, "they 

 will run their teeth (tusks) through the body, and then tear 

 it in pieces and throw it limb from limb ; " but a Kandyan 

 chief, who was witness to such scenes, has assured 

 me that the elephant never once applied its tusks, 

 but, placing its foot on the prostrate victim, plucked 

 off his limbs in succession by a sudden movement of 

 the trunk. If the tusks were designed to be employed 

 offensively, some alertness would naturally be exhibited 

 in using them ; but in numerous instances where sports- 

 men have fallen into the power of a wounded elephant, 

 they have escaped through the failure of the enraged 

 animal to strike them with its tusks, even when stretched 

 upon the ground. 2 



1 In the Third Book of Macca- (irijurpeiv eh afyp ev ySvatri kol\ noa! 



bees, which is not printed in our frrfyuW yKKrixhovs. 3 Mac. v. 42). 



Apocrypha, but appears in the se- ./Elian makes the remark, that 



ries in the Greek Septuagint, the elephants on such occasions use 



author, in describing the persecu- their knees as well as their feet to 



tion of the Jews by Ptolemy Phi- crush their victims. — Hist Anim. 



lopater, b.c. 210, states that the viii. 10. 



king swore vehemently that he 2 The Hastisilpe, a Singhalese 



would send them into the other work which treats of the " Science 



world, "foully trampled to death of Elephants," enumerates amongst 



by the knees and feet of elephants" those which it is not desirable to 



% 



G 4 



