In following wild elephants, sportsmen often have favorable opportunities to observe the habits and customs of the great game in their native wilds; and on such an occasion a fight between two tuskers was witnessed. Such an instance is recorded in the following: “We ran towards the place where the sounds of contest were increasing every moment: a deep ravine at last only separated us from the combatants, and we could see the tops of the bamboos bowing as the monsters bore each other backwards and forwards with a crashing noise in their tremendous struggles. As we ran along the bank of the nullah to find a crossing, one elephant uttered a deep roar of pain, and crossed the nullah some forty yards in advance of us to our side. Here he commenced to destroy a bamboo clump (the bamboos in these hills have a very large hollow, and are weak and comparatively worthless) in sheer fury, grumbling deeply the while with rage and pain. Blood was streaming the while from a deep stab in his left side high up. He was a very large elephant, with long and fairly thick tusks, and with much white above the forehead: the left tusk was some inches shorter than the right. The opponent of this Goliath must have been a monster indeed, to have worsted him.
“An elephant-fight, if the combatants are well matched, frequently lasts for a day or more, a round being fought every now and then. The beaten elephant retreats temporarily, followed leisurely by the other, until, by mutual consent, they meet again. The more powerful elephant occasionally keeps his foe in view till he perhaps kills him: otherwise the beaten elephant takes himself off for good on finding he has the worst of it. Tails are frequently bitten off in these encounters. This mutilation is common amongst rogue elephants, and amongst the females in a herd. In the latter case, it is generally the result of rivalry amongst themselves.
“The wounded tusker was evidently the temporarily beaten combatant of the occasion; and I have seldom seen such a picture of power and rage as he presented, mowing the bamboos down with trunk and tusks, and bending the thickest part over with his fore-feet. Suddenly his whole demeanor changed: he backed from the clump, and stood like a statue. Not a sound broke the stillness for an instant. His antagonist was silent, wherever he was. Now the tip of his trunk came slowly round in our direction, and I saw that we were discovered to his fine sense of smell. We had been standing silently behind a thin bamboo clump, watching him; and, when I first saw that he had winded us, I imagined that he might take himself off. But his frenzy quite overcame all fear for the moment. Forward went his ears, and up went his tail, in a way which no one who has once seen the signal in a wild elephant can mistake the significance of; and in the same instant he wheeled about with astonishing swiftness, getting at once into full speed, and bore down upon us. The bamboos, by which we were partly hidden, were useless as a cover, and would have prevented a clear shot: so I slipped out into open ground. The instant the elephant commenced his charge, I gave a shout, hoping to stop him, which failed. I had my No. 4 double smooth bore, loaded with ten drachms, in hand. I fired when the elephant was about nine paces off, aiming into his coiled trunk about one foot above the fatal bump between the eyes; as his head was held very high, and this allowance had to be made for its elevation. I felt confident of the shot, but made a grand mistake in not giving him both barrels. It was useless to reserve the left, as I did, at such close quarters; and I deserved more than what followed for doing so. The smoke from the ten drachms obscured the elephant, and I stepped quickly to see where he lay. Good Heavens! he had not been even checked, and was upon me. There was no time to step to right or left. His tusks came through the smoke (his head being now held low) like the cow-catcher of a locomotive, and I had just time to fall flat to avoid being hurled in front of him. I fell a little to the right. The next instant down came his ponderous foot within a few inches of my left thigh; and I should have been trodden upon had I not been quick enough, when I saw the fore-foot coming, to draw my leg from the sprawling position in which I fell. As the elephant rushed over me, he shrieked shrilly, which showed his trunk was uncoiled; and his head also being held low, instead of in a charging position, I rightly inferred that he was in full flight. Had he stopped, I should have been caught; but the heavy bullet had taken all the fight out of him. Jaffer had been disposed of by a recoiling bamboo, and was now lying almost in the elephant’s line. Fortunately, however, the brute held on. I was covered with blood from the wound inflicted by his late antagonist in his left side: even my hair was matted together when the blood became dry. How it was that I did not bag the elephant, I can’t tell.”
A good idea of the excitement and sport of elephant-hunting is obtained from the following account, from the pen of Sir Victor Brooke, of a hunt participated in by him and Col. Douglas Hamilton in the Billiga-rungun hills. The adventure is particularly interesting, as the tusks were the largest ever taken in India:—
“In July, 1863, Col. Douglas Hamilton and I were shooting in the Hássanoor hills, Southern India. We had had excellent sport, but, until the date of the death of the big tusker, had not come across any elephants. Upon the morning of that day, in the jungles to the east of the Hássanoor bungalow, we had tracked up a fine tusker, which, partly from over-anxiety, and partly, I must confess, from the effect on my nervous system of the presence of the first wild bull elephant I had ever seen, I failed to bag. About mid-day I was lying on my bed, chewing the cud of vexation, and inwardly vowing terrible vengeance on the next tusker I might meet, when two natives came in to report a herd of elephants in a valley some three or four miles to the north of our camp. To prepare ourselves was the work of a few seconds. As we arrived on the ridge overlooking the valley where the elephants were, we heard the crackling of bamboos, and occasionally caught sight of the track of an elephant as it crossed a break amongst the confused mass of tree-tops upon which we were gazing. Presently one of the elephants trumpeted loudly, which attracted the attention of some people herding cattle on the opposite side of the valley, who, seeing us, and divining our intentions, yelled out, ‘Ánay! ánay!’ (elephants) at the top of their voices, in the hope, no doubt, of receiving reward for their untimely information. The effect of these discordant human cries was magical. Every matted clump seemed to heave and shake, and vomit forth an elephant. With marvellous silence and quickness the huge beasts marshalled themselves together; and, by the time they appeared on the more open ground of the open valley, a mighty cavalcade was formed, which, once seen, can never be forgotten. There were about eighty elephants in the herd. Towards the head of the procession was a noble bull with a pair of tusks such as are seldom seen in India nowadays. Following him in a direct line came a medley of elephants of lower degree,—bulls, cows, and calves of every size, some of the latter frolicking with comic glee, and running in among the legs of their elders with the utmost confidence. It was truly a splendid sight; and I really believe, that, while it lasted, neither Col. Hamilton nor I entertained any feeling but that of intense admiration and wonder. At length this great exhibition was, we believed, over; and we were commencing to arrange our mode of attack when that hove in sight which called forth an ejaculation of astonishment from each one of us. Striding along thoughtfully in the rear of the herd, many of the members of which were doubtless his children and his children’s children, came a mighty bull, the like of which neither of my companions after many years of jungle experience, nor the natives who were with us, had ever seen before. But it was not merely the stature of the noble beast that astonished us; for that, though great, could not be considered unrivalled. It was the sight of his enormous tusks, which projected like a gleam of light through the grass, through which he was slowly wending his way, that held us rooted to the spot. With an almost solemn expression of countenance, Col. Hamilton turned to me, and said, ‘There’s the largest tusker in India, old boy; and, come what may, you must get him, and take his tusk to Ireland with you.’ It was in vain that I expostulated with my dear old friend, recalling my morning’s mishap, and reminding him, that, in jungle laws, it stands written, ‘Shot turn and turn about at elephants.’ It was of no avail. ‘You must bag that tusker,’ was all the answer I could get.
“It took us but a short time to run down the slope, and to find the track which swept like a broad avenue along the bed of the valley. Cautiously we followed it up, and, after about a quarter of a mile, came upon the elephants. They were standing in perfect silence around the borders of a small glade, in the middle of which stood the great tusker, quite alone, and broadside to us. He was about fifty yards from us, and therefore out of all elephant-shooting range; but the difficulty was to shorten the distance. The approach direct was impossible, owing to the absolute want of cover: so, after some deliberation, we decided on working to the right, and endeavoring to creep up behind a solitary tree, which stood about twenty yards behind the elephant. When within ten yards of this tree, we found to our annoyance a watchful old cow, who was not farther than fifteen yards from us, and to our right, and had decided suspicions of our proximity. To attempt to gain another foot would have been to run the risk of disturbing the elephants. Seeing this, and knowing the improbability of our ever getting the bull outside the herd again, Col. Hamilton recommended me to creep a little to the left, so as to get the shot behind his ear, and to try the effect of my big Purdy rifle, while he kept his eye on the old cow in case her curiosity should induce her to become unpleasant. I should mention that we now, for the first time, perceived that the old bull had only one perfect tusk, the left one being a mere stump, projecting but little beyond the upper lip. I accordingly followed Col. Hamilton’s instructions. At the shot, the old bull, with a shrill trumpet of pain and rage, swung around on his hind-legs as on a pivot, receiving my second barrel, and two from Col. Hamilton. This staggered the old fellow dreadfully; and, as he stood facing us, Col. Hamilton ran up within twelve yards of him with a very large single-bore rifle, and placed a bullet between his eyes. Had the rifle been as good as it was big, I believe this would have ended the fray; but, though its shock produced a severe momentary effect, the bullet had, as we afterwards ascertained, only penetrated three or four inches into the cancellous tissue of the frontal bone. After swaying backwards and forwards for a moment or two, during which I gave him both barrels of my second rifle, the grand old beast seemed to rally all his forces, and, rolling up his trunk, and sticking his tail in the air, rushed off trumpeting, and whistling like a steam-engine.
“Col. Hamilton followed, and fired two more barrel-shots, while I remained behind to reload the empty rifles. This completed, I joined my friend, whom I found standing in despair at the edge of a small ravine overgrown with tangled underwood, into which the tusker had disappeared. For some little time I found it difficult to persuade Col. Hamilton to continue the chase. Long experience had taught him how rarely elephants once alarmed are met with a second time the same day. At length, however, finding that I was determined to follow the tracks of the noble beast until I lost them, even should it involve sleeping upon them, my gallant old friend gave way, and entered eagerly into a pursuit which at the time he considered almost, if not absolutely, useless. It would be tedious, even if it were possible, to describe all the details of the long, stern chase which followed. After emerging from the thorny ravine into which the elephant had disappeared, the tracks led over a series of extensive open grassy glades, crossed the Mysore-Hássanoor road beyond the seventh milestone, and then followed the deep, sandy bed of a dry river for a considerable distance. At length, when about nine weary miles had been left behind us, we began to remark signs of the elephant having relaxed a little in its direct onward flight. His tracks commenced to zigzag backwards and forwards in an undecided manner, and finally led down a steep, grassy slope into a densely matted, thorny jungle bordering a small stream at its foot. I was the first to arrive at the edge of the thicket, and without waiting for my companions, who were out of sight, followed the tracks cautiously into it. I soon found that it was almost impossible to track the elephant any farther. The entire thicket was traversed by a perfect labyrinth of elephant-paths, and on each path were more or less recent footprints of elephants. Giving up the idea of tracking for a moment, I was on the point of commencing a further exploration of the thicket, when a low hiss attracted my attention; and, looking around, I saw a native who had accompanied us, beckoning to me, and gesticulating to me in the most frantic manner. Upon going to him, he pointed eagerly in front of him; and, following the direction of his finger, my eyes alighted, not on the elephant as I expected, but upon Col. Hamilton, who, from behind the trunk of a small tree, was gazing intently towards the little stream, which ran not more than thirty yards from where he was standing. With the greatest care I stole to his side. ‘There he is, in front of you, standing in the stream. You had better take him at once, or he will be off again,’ were the welcome words which greeted my ears. At the same moment my eyes were gratified by the indistinct outline of the mighty bull, who, already suspicious of danger, was standing perfectly motionless in the middle of the stream, which was so narrow that the branches of the low bamboos on its banks nearly met across it. The distance, twenty-seven yards, was too great for certainty: but there was no choice; as, even if the elephant had been utterly unaware of our vicinity, the tangled, thorny nature of the dense jungle surrounding him would have rendered it impossible to approach nearer without discovery. As it was, the perfect immobility of all save his eye, and every now and then the quickly altered position of his tattered ears, showed undeniably that the chances of flight and battle were being weighed in the massive head, and that there was no time to lose. Covering the orifice of the ear with as much ease as if the shot had been at an egg at a hundred yards, I fired. A heavy crash, and the sudden expulsion of the stream from its bed ten or twelve feet into the air, followed the report; and I have a dim recollection of my old friend hugging me the next minute in his delight while he exclaimed, ‘Splendid, old boy! he’s dead, and the biggest tusker ever killed in India.’ But our work was not over yet. With one or two tremendous lurches from side to side, the old bull regained his feet, but only to be again felled by my second barrel, and this time to rise no more. The shades of evening were closing in fast, and a long journey lay between us and home, so we had but a few moments to admire the grandest trophy it has ever fallen to the lot of a sportsman to secure.”
This hunt not only shows the endurance required, but the remarkable faculty of the elephant in travelling great distances when so desperately wounded, and the necessity of the heaviest ammunition to prevent prolonged suffering in the noble animals. When an elephant has been shot in the manner described by Sir Victor, the tusks are secured as trophies, and sometimes the head and other parts. They are either cut out with an axe, or left for ten or twelve days, when they can be easily drawn out of the alveole. The lowest Mysore inhabitants will not eat elephant flesh, though they have no objection to carrion; but the Chittagong hill people eat it with avidity. The tail is also used as a trophy; while the feet are taken and upholstered as footstools, and presented to the sportsman’s lady friends. The feet of calves are converted into cigar-boxes, for the fortunate hunter’s gentleman acquaintances; while tobacco-boxes, inkstands, and various articles are also made as mementoes of the hunt.
As the elephant shot by Sir Victor Brooke had the largest tusk ever observed in an Asiatic elephant, I give the measurements:—