1862.] 
197 
Correspondence . 
the wounded Elephant. He often finds him, so weakened by loss of 
blood as to be unable to keep up with the rest of the herd, and a 
new wound is soon inflicted. Patiently pursuing this practice, the 
hunter has secured many of these princes of the forest.” 
In another place (I, 896), but again with reference to the valley 
of the Kina Batangan river, Mr. St. John remarks—“ As this is the 
only country in Borneo where the Elephants are numerous, it is the 
only one where ivory forms an important article of trade in the eyes 
of the natives.” 
Now, I am well aware of Mr. Darwin’s calculation as to what the 
accumulated progeny of one pair of slow-breeding Elephants might 
amount to, in the course of five centuries, supposing that naught 
happened to check their increase in the geometrical ratio ; but I 
doubt exceedingly that, in the instance under consideration, the 
existing great herds of Elephants in the N. E. peninsula of Borneo 
have descended from some two or three individuals put ashore by the 
order of the Sultan of Sulu, a little more than a century ago ; con¬ 
tinually decimated, too, as these Elephants would seem to have been 
and are at this time : and I doubt it all the more, because it appears 
that wild herds of Elephants existed until recently in Sulu ! Why, 
therefore, should the few tame Elephants presented to the Sultan of 
Sulu be landed in Borneo ? The remnant of the wild race existed 
in Sulu within the memory of people now living ! On this subject, 
Mr. St. John fortunately helps us with information. In his notice 
of Sulu, he remarks (II, 243),—“ Remembering Forest’s statement 
that Elephants were found in his time in the forests which clothed 
so much of the soil of the island, I asked Dater Daniel about it; 
his answer was, that even within the remembrance of the oldest men 
then alive, there were still a few Elephants left in the woods, but 
that, finding they committed so much damage to the plantations, the 
villagers had combined and hunted the beasts till, they were all 
killed : I was pleased to find the old traveller’s account confirmed.” 
II, 243.* 
* Unfortunately, Mr. St. John is no naturalist. The little ‘ Mouse Deer’ he 
calls the ‘ Moose Deer’ (II, 52), like some of our countrymen in Ceylon ; thus 
confounding the very smallest of the Deer tribe with the very largest; and the 
tiny animal of the tropics with the giant of northern regions! Of his two 
kinds of horned Deer (1, 33), I take the Rusa Rahim to be the Javanese Rusa, 
and the Rusa Lalang to meau the Muntjac. The latter, however, is elsewhere 
