for their ivory to be an article of commerce, can have descended from an imported stock. My principal informant on the subject, to whom I have applied for what further information he may be able to give me, is Capt. Mottley (at present of Akyab), brother of the naturalist whose name is associated with that of the Rev. Mr. Dillwyn in Messrs. Mottley and Dillwyn's 'Fauna of Labuan' (and who perished with his family in the massacre at Banjermassing). Capt. Mottley was long associated with his late brother, as he mentioned to me in conversation, when I was at Akyab. In a paper on Borneo published in the 'Singapore Chronicle' for December, 1824 (and reprinted in Moor's 'Notices of the Indian Archipelago'), we are told that" Of land animals, there exist the Elephant, the Rhinoceros, a species of Leopard [FELIS MACROCELIS]-but not the royal Tiger," &c. &c. "The first three animals, it is singular enough, are found only in a single corner of this vast island, its northern peninsular extremity, in the districts of Ungsang and Paitan. *** The Ox [Bos SONDAICUS], under the name of Tambadao, is a native of the forests of Borneo ; and so is the Hog" [SUS BARBATUS]. In a sketch of Borneo, or Pulo Kálámantan (the Malayan name of the entire island, as distinguished from its province of Borneo), communicated by J. Hunt, Esq., in 1812, to Sir T. S. Raffles, then Lieut.-Governor of Jáva, (and also reprinted in Moor's 'Notices of the Indian Archipelago,') it is stated that--"The Elephant was said to be seen about Cape Unsing, where several teeth are still found; but it is conceived that this animal is extinct on the island." These are the only printed notices that I can at present recal to mind, relative to the existence of Elephants in Borneo.

The only species of Elephant, which, according to our present knowledge, is known to inhabit India proper-as distinguished from Indo-China and Malasia (or Malayana),-Prof. Schlegel designates as the "so-called ELEPHAS INDICUS ;" and he remarks, that, so far as he "could discover, the greater number of Elephants brought to Europe from continental India, have been obtained from Bengal. It remains therefore a question," he adds, "whether all the Elephants of continental India belong really to one species, or whether, in these widely extended regions, there may not be different species of Elephants, and the Elephant of trans-Gangetic India may not perhaps belong to E. SUMATRANUS. A similar question may be asked

with respect to the Elephant of Southern India, compared with the E. SUMATRANUS of Ceylon, since these districts approach one another very nearly. We have, it is true, no more reasons for answering these questions in the affirmative than the negative; but they must be determined by ascertaining the facts, in order to know the exact boundaries of the range of E. INDICUS."

On this subject, I have to remark, that (at the present time at least,) the Elephant is quite as much an imported or introduced animal in Bengal proper, as it is in Jáva; for the very few that roam the Rajmahal hills are known to be animals escaped from their quondam human owners, and perhaps there may be some that are the progeny of such escaped animals. The appellation of "Bengalese Elephant," habitually made use of by Prof. Schlegel, is therefore inappropriate; although wild Elephants do exist, chiefly on the eastern outskirts of the province, and along the base of the Himalayas. I have not had the opportunity of examining the grinders of wild Elephants from the peninsula of India; but I have lost no chance of examining those of wild Burmese Elephants, which indicate the species to be INDICUS, as distinguished from suMATRANUS. Even here I must remark, that the tame Elephants employed at Moulmain, so celebrated for their intelligence in piling timber, &c., (which feats I have witnessed,) and also those extensively employed in the teak-forests of the interior, are brought down all the way from the Shan states; the Burmese method of hunting wild Elephants proving successful only in procuring small individuals, below the commissariat standard, and unequal to the labours imposed by the timber-merchants. The entire Indo-Chinese region (or 'trans-Gangetic India,' though even Hither China' would much better express the affinities of the human inhabitants,) would appear to be emphatically the main habitat of E. INDICUS, seemingly extending down the Malayan peninsula in one direction, and along the southern base of the Himalayas in another: there are still many in the Deyra Doon; and others in Cuttack, Central India, Malabar, &c., which it has now become desirable to examine more critically.

According to Professor Schlegel, "The Elephant of Sumátra and Ceylon (E. SUMATRANUS) has small ears, like E. INDICUS; and approaches this species also in the form of its skull, and the number of the caudal vertebræ: but the lamina of its teeth are wider; and

in the number of its dorsal vertebræ and pairs of ribs, it differs from both the other known species. As far as we know, there are seven cervical, three lumbar, and four sacral vertebræ in all the species of ELEPHAS alike. E. SUMATRANUS and E. INDICUS agree in the number of caudal vertebræ, which is usually thirty-three, but in very young examples sometimes only thirty. In E. AFRICANUS, on the other hand, the tail never contains more than twenty-six vertebræ. Finally, the number of dorsal vertebræ and pairs of ribs are different in each of the three living species of Elephant; being in E. AFRICANUS twenty-one, in E. SUMATRANUS twenty, and in E. INDICUS nineteen.*

"It is also remarkable, that the number of true ribs is alike in all the species, that is, only five; whilst in the three species, as above given, the corresponding numbers of false ribs is fifteen, fourteen, and thirteen. Hence it follows that the augmentation of these parts, in the different species, takes place in the direction of the hindmost dorsal vertebræ and pairs of ribs.

"The lamina of the teeth afford another distinction, which, however, is less apparent to the eye than that taken from the number of the vertebræ. These laminæ, or bands, in E. SUMATRANUS are wider (or, if one way so say, broader in the direction of the long axis of the teeth,) than in E. INDICUS. In making this comparison, one must remark that the distinction is less evident in younger individuals ; and that there are met with, in all species of Elephants, within certain definite limits, remarkable individual differences in respect of the width of these laminæ.

"In their external form, also, the two Asiatic Elephants appear to present some differences. Heer Westerman, Director of the Gardens of the Zoological Society of Amsterdam, which has for several years possessed two female Elephants of moderate size, one [received] from Calcutta and the other from Sumátra, informs me, on this subject, that the Sumátran animal is more slender and more finely built that the Bengalese [wherever that might have originally come from!], that it has a longer and thinner snout, and that the rump at the end is more broadened and covered with longer and stronger

The skeleton of ELEPHAS INDICUS in the Society's museum, and also that in the museum of the Calcutta Medical College, are those of the true continental species, according to Professor Schlegel's diagnosis.

hairs, in which respect it reminds one rather of the African than the Indian Elephant, and, lastly, that the Sumátran animal is more remarkable for its intellectual development than the Indian.*

"The last mentioned observation agrees, in a remarkable way," continues Prof. Schlegel, "with what Heer Diard has lately written concerning the Elephant of Ceylon. He says, on this matter,-“l' Elephant de Ceylan se distingue de celui des Indes par une aptitude d'intelligence instinctive, celle de facile éducabilité: aussi ces Elephans de Ceylan, de tout temps recherchés par les Princes de l'Inde se trouvent l'être encore aujourdhui plus qu' áucun outre par les Anglais pour les differens services auxquel on les employe. Jái eu l'occasion d'observer pleuseurs grandes troupes de ces animaux et une particuliérement, qui avais finie par se laisser prendre dans une grande enceinte établié par les ordres du Gouvernment, qui a cette époque ou la guerre de l'Inde était encore loin d'etre terminée faisait tout ce qu'il est possible pour recruiter un certain nombre de ces animaux afin de les deriger vers le Bengale."

From my own familiar observation of the intelligence of tame Elephants, whether in Lower Bengal, Oudh, or Burmá, I am inclined to doubt exceedingly the alleged fact of the superior qualities, in this respect, of the Cinghalese Elephant. Individual differences occur, no doubt, as in other animals; and no slight diversity of character. I also do not remember that any Elephants arrived at Calcutta from Ceylon during the period of the repression of the Indian mutinies; though some may have been sent, likely enough, from that island to Madras. The grand importation, at that time, of Elephants into Calcutta was from the ports of Rangoon and Moulmein; and the animals in question were brought thither froin the Shan states beyond the British boundary.

The assigned habitat of Calcutta for a tame Elephant may be estimated from the following extract :—

Col. A. P. Phayre, now Chief Commissioner of British Burmá, remarks, in his Report on the Administration of the Province of Pegu' during 1858-9, that-" Not less than one thousand and thirtyfour (1,034) Elephants have been shipped from Rangoon and Moulmein, for the Madras coast and Bengal, during the period extending

* It may here be noticed that Prof. Schlegel has reason to suspect the existence of more than one species of African Elephant.

from Dec. 1857 to April 1859. It may be assumed," continues Col. Phayre, "that so many of these powerful animals were never before, whether in ancient or modern times, conveyed across sea, or otherwise from one country to another, in the short period of seventeen months, whether for military or other objects." And of this great number, it may be added, that not a single one will probably have propagated its race after its capture! A young Elephant was born, I learned, on its voyage from Moulmein to Madras, survived the voyage, and was alive a year or more afterwards, if not at the present time, as is most probably the case.

On application to the Military Commissariat Office, I am obligingly informed that "The following is an account of the Elephants received in Calcutta from Moulmein and Rangoon.

"I do not know," continues my informant, "how many more were landed in the Madras Presidency.

"No Elephants were received at Calcutta from Ceylon."

The accuracy of the foregoing statement may be fully relied on.

P. S. No. 4. The genera ELEPHAS and RHINOCEROS were placed by Linnæus (Gmelin's edit., A. D. 1788,) in his order Bruta; while he associated the Horse with the Hog and the Hippopotamus in his order Bellua. It is remarkable, too, that he refers to Rhinoceroses bearing a third horn.* Báber, it has been remarked, hunted some species of Rhinoceros on the banks of the Indus; and in Dr. Parsons's description of a Rhinoceros procured when young by "Humphrey Cole, Esq.; being Chief of the Factory of Patna in Bengal," in the Phil. Trans., Vol.

To his description of Rh. bicornis, it is added-" Rarior est Rhinoceros tricornis, tertio tum cornu ex alterutro priorum excrescente."