there are a
plenty of wild ones not far away in less populous districts, including
bears, deer, leopards, and elephants. The buffalo is almost an
amphibious animal, and may be seen for many hours daily nearly
immersed in the ponds, lakes, or rivers, only its head, horns, and
nose visible above the water. Thus he will lie or stand for any length
of time, chewing the cud like other creatures of his kind, until
hunger compels him to seek food on the dry land. Happy for him if he
be not attacked, while thus exposed, by the voracious pond leeches,
more fatal than the flies which he strives to avoid by thus immersing
his body. The elephants are still numerous, notwithstanding so many
have been exported to the continent hard by. A carefully prepared
estimate published at Colombo last year (close of 1893) places the
probable number of wild elephants in Ceylon at five thousand. It is
also believed that the small numbers of these animals which are now
shot by Europeans annually will not decrease this aggregate, because
of the natural breeding which is all the time going on. There are also
found here in abundance the wild boar, jackal, ant-eater, and a great
variety of monkeys (the latter afraid only of Europeans), and the
cheetah. This last named is an animal of the leopard family, nearly
three feet in height, and six feet long from nose to tail-tip, but
exceedingly active and over-fond of monkey-flesh. It is of a dun
color, with round black spots distributed uniformly over the body.

The tiny musk-deer, so called, though it has no musk-bag or scent
about it of that pungent nature, is indigenous to Ceylon. There is a
stuffed specimen in the Colombo museum, but the author did not happen
to see one alive. It is only about twelve or fourteen inches long and
ten high when at maturity, but it is formed exactly like a full-grown
North American deer or antelope, having a gray hide dappled with white
spots, like a young fawn. Its exquisite delicacy of limbs is very
beautiful. Several attempts have been made to transport a pair from
this island to the Zoological Gardens of London, but the little
creatures have never survived the voyage. They prove to be as delicate
in constitution as in physical formation.

We have incidentally mentioned the wild boar, to hunt which is a sport
that has brought nearly as many Englishmen to Ceylon as has that
generally more attractive and much larger game, the wild elephant.
Strange to say, the boar, weig