followed by large parties of
European sportsmen; and the Singhalese themselves, being more freely
provided with arms than in former times, have assisted in swelling the
annual slaughter.[3]

[Footnote 1: LE BRUN, who visited Ceylon A.D. 1705, says that in the
district round Colombo, where elephants are now never seen, they were
then so abundant, that 160 had been taken in a single corral. (_Voyage_,
&c., tom. ii. ch. lxiii. p. 331.)]

[Footnote 2: In some parts of Bengal, where elephants were formerly
troublesome (especially near the wilds of Ramgur), the natives got rid
of them by mixing a preparation of the poisonous Nepal root called
_dakra_ in balls of grain, and other materials, of which the animal is
fond. In Cuttack, above fifty years ago, mineral poison was laid for
them in the same way, and the carcases of eighty were found which had
been killed by it. (_Asiat. Res._, xv. 183.)]

[Footnote 3: The number of elephants has been similarly reduced
throughout the south of India.]

Had the motive that incites to the destruction of the elephant in Africa
and India prevailed in Ceylon, that is, had the elephants there been
provided with tusks, they would long since have been annihilated for the
sake of their ivory.[1] But it is a curious fact that, whilst in Africa
and India both sexes have tusks[2], with some slight disproportion in
the size of those of the females: not one elephant in a hundred is found
with tusks in Ceylon, and the few that possess them are exclusively
males. Nearly all, however, have those stunted processes called
_tushes_, about ten or twelve inches in length and one or two in
diameter. These I have observed them to use in loosening earth,
stripping off bark, and snapping asunder small branches and climbing
plants; and hence tushes are seldom seen without a groove worn into them
near their extremities.[3]

[Footnote 1: The annual importation of ivory into Great Britain alone,
for the last few years, has been about _one million_ pounds; which,
taking the average weight of a tusk at sixty pounds, would require the
slaughter of 8,333 male elephants.

But of this quantity the importation from Ceylon has generally averaged
only five or six hundred weight; which, making allowance for the
lightness of the tusks, would not involve the destruction of more than
seven or eight in each year. At the same time, this does not fairly
represent the annual number of tuskers shot in Ceylon, not only because
a