The height of elephants varies to a great degree, and in all cases is very deceiving.In Ceylon, an elephant is measured at the shoulder, and nine feet at this point is a very large animal.There is no doubt that many elephants far exceed this, as I have shot them so large that two tall men could lie at full length from the point of the forefoot to the shoulder; but this is not a common size: the average height at the shoulder would be about seven feet.(The males 7 ft.6 in., the females 7 ft., at the shoulder.)Not more than one in three hundred has tusks; they are merely provided with short grubbers, projecting generally about three inches from the upper jaw, and about two inches in diameter; these are called 'tushes'
in Ceylon, and are of so little value that they are not worth extracting from the head.They are useful to the elephants in hooking on to a branch and tearing it down.
Elephants are gregarious, and the average number in a herd is about eight, although they frequently form bodies of fifty and even eighty in one troop.Each herd consists of a very large proportion of females, and they are constantly met without a single bull in their number.I have seen some small herds formed exclusively of bulls, but this is very rare.The bull is much larger than the female, and is generally more savage.His habits frequently induce him to prefer solitude to a gregarious life.He then becomes doubly vicious.He seldom strays many miles from one locality, which he haunts for many years.He becomes what is termed a 'rogue.' He then waylays the natives, and in fact becomes a scourge to the neighbourhood, attacking the inoffensive without the slightest provocation, carrying destruction into the natives'
paddy-fields, and perfectly regardless of night fires or the usual precautions for scaring wild beasts.
The daring pluck of these 'rogues' is only equalled by their extreme cunning.Endowed with that wonderful power of scent peculiar to elephants, he travels in the day-time DOWN the wind; thus nothing can follow upon his track without his knowledge.He winds his enemy as the cautious hunter advances noiselessly upon his track, and he stands with ears thrown forward, tail erect, trunk thrown high in the air, with its distended tip pointed to the spot from which he winds the silent but approaching danger.Perfectly motionless does he stand, like a statue in ebony, the very essence of attention, every nerve of scent and hearing stretched to its cracking point; not a muscle moves, not a sound of a rustling branch against his rough sides; he is a mute figure of wild and fierce eagerness.Meanwhile, the wary tracker stoops to the ground, and with a practised eye pierces the tangled brushwood in search of his colossal feet.Still farther and farther he silently creeps forward, when suddenly a crash bursts through the jungle; the moment has arrived for the ambushed charge, and the elephant is upon him.
What increases the danger is the uncertainty prevailing in all the movements of a 'rogue'.You may perhaps see him upon a plain or in a forest.As you advance, he retreats, or he may at once charge.Should he retreat, you follow him; but you may shortly discover that he is leading you to some favourite haunt of thick jungle or high grass, from which, when you least expect it, he will suddenly burst out in full charge upon you.
Next to a 'rogue' in ferocity, and even more persevering in the pursuit of her victim, is a female elephant when her young one has been killed.
In such a case she will generally follow up her man until either he or she is killed.If any young elephants are in the herd, the mothers frequently prove awkward customers.
Elephant-shooting is doubtless the most dangerous of all sports if the game is invariably followed up; but there is a great difference between elephant-killing and elephant-hunting; the latter is sport, the former is slaughter.
Many persons who have killed elephants know literally nothing about the sport, and they may ever leave Ceylon with the idea that an elephant is not a dangerous animal.Their elephants are killed in this way, viz.:
The party of sportsmen, say two or three, arrive at a certain district.
The headman is sent for from the village; he arrives.The enquiry respecting the vicinity of elephants is made; a herd is reported to be in the neighbourhood, and trackers and watchers are sent out to find them.
In the meantime the tent is pitched, our friends are employed in unpacking the guns, and, after some hours have elapsed, the trackers return: they have found the herd, and the watchers are left to observe them.
The guns are loaded and the party starts.The trackers run quickly on the track until they meet one of the watchers who has been sent back upon the track by the other watchers to give the requisite information of the movements of the herd since the trackers left.One tracker now leads the way, and they cautiously proceed.The boughs are heard slightly rustling as the unconscious elephants are fanning the flies from their bodies within a hundred yards of the guns.
