nerous and regal hospitality
the author has enjoyed, sends elephants to bring his invited guests to
visit him, and also returns them to their residences in the same
manner. The animals which were employed on the occasion referred to
came originally from the Kandy hills in Ceylon. They were docile
creatures, which knelt at the word of command for us to mount to the
frame seats on their backs. Each carried six persons besides the
driver. We were told that it costs as much to feed one elephant as to
keep eight horses. This independent prince has a territory about the
size of Massachusetts, with a million and a half of contented
subjects. His capital--Jeypoor--is the finest and most thrifty native
city in all India, where, wonderful to say, there are no beggars, nor,
so far as a transient visitor could discover, nuisances of any sort to
complain of. It was a dusty season, as is well remembered, but the
streets and squares of the capital were being carefully sprinkled by
native water-carriers,--in a very primitive manner, to be sure, but
showing a due consideration for the comfort of the public.

There is a vast difference between a tame and a wild elephant; the
latter, when entirely subdued and domesticated, is of comparatively
little consequence. His main occupation in our country is that of
eating peanuts, candies, and fruit doled out to him by visitors to the
menageries, and the performance of a few highly sagacious tricks. In
their wild state they are the wariest and most cunning of all the
denizens of the forest. Nor are they devoid of courage and ferocity
when brought to bay, and many experienced hunters have lost their
lives in Ceylon while pursuing them. When domesticated in this island
they are of great service to the farmers, especially in plowing,
harrowing, and rolling the newly broken land. A cultivator which would
anchor half a dozen yokes of native bullocks is walked away with in
the easiest manner imaginable by a single elephant. They are
particularly sagacious in dam-building across streams, and in the
construction of bridges, placing the heavy materials just where they
are required, and even fitting large logs and stones in their proper
places. The amount of food which so large an animal requires is,
however, a serious drawback to their employment. Besides five or six
hundred pounds of green fodder, an elephant must eat at least twenty
pounds of some kind of grain daily, rice preferred, to keep him in
wor