292 
Elephant-hunting. 
appeared quite tractable, shewed no symptom of being mis* 
chievous, and readily obeyed their keepers. 
The superiority of the elephants of Ceylon does not consist 
in their size, (for they are in general not so tall as those on 
the continent;) but in their greater hardiness and powers for 
exertion, in their docility and freedom from vice and passion. 
The natives are so possessed with the idea of the excellence of 
their own elephants, as to affirm that the elephants of all 
other parts of the world make obeisance before those of Cey- 
lon, and thus instinctively acknowledge their superiority. 
These lords of the forest, though from their size and strength 
formidable to all its other inhabitants, themselves live in con- 
tinual apprehension of a small reptile, against which neither 
their sagacity nor their prowess can at all defend them. This 
diminutive creature gets into the trunk of the elephant, and 
pursues its course till it finally fixes in his head, and by keep- 
ing him in continual agony, at length torments the stupendous 
animal to death. So dreadfully afraid are the elephants of 
this dangerous enemy, that they use a variety of precautions 
to prevent his attacks ; and never lay their trunks to the 
ground, except when to gather or separate their food. 
The struggles which the elephants make to prevent them- 
selves from being secured, and the violence employed to render 
them tame, produce a number of accidents of which some of 
them die, while others are rendered completely useless. Not 
above half of those driven into the enclosure, or otherwise 
taken, can be preserved from injury so as to be afterwards 
brought to sale. The hunt in 1797 was the greatest ever 
known till that time ; but since I left the island there has been 
a hunt in which upwards of four hundred elephants were taken. 
