The Ivory King: A popular history of the elephant and its allies

by Charles Frederick Holder

While the canal of Beejapore was being made, a rogue elephant charged upon the men from some bushes, and seized one; then, pressing the body under its ponderous feet, the fiend deliberately pulled away the upper portion of it, and with a remnant in its trunk ran back into the bush.

Some woodmen engaged in cutting trees in the jungle about Chandnee-Doon, had an almost identical experience. One day three of them remained at home; while, during the day, one of the men went to a neighboring spring to draw some water. As he did not return, one of his companions went after him; and that evening they were both found dead, their bones being crushed and broken. The rogue had seized and thrown them to the ground, crushing them by a tread of its ponderous foot.

In Ceylon, the rogue is called a hora, or ronkedor; the Singhalese, according to Tennent, believing it to be an individual that has either lost its associates by accident, and, from its solitary life, become morose and savage; or a naturally vicious individual, that, being more daring, has separated itself from its companions. Whatever may be the reason for the savage temper exhibited by these solitary brutes, they constitute a characteristic of elephant life, and, in Ceylon, seem to possess the same likes and dislikes that mark the African and Asiatic rogues.

More daring than the peacefully disposed elephants, they come out of the jungle at night, and prowl around the towns and villages, trampling down cultivated tracts, devouring the standing rice and young cocoa-palms, becoming so bold in some places, that one has been known to enter a field, and seize a sheaf from a pile in the very midst of a party of workers, who fled in terror. As a rule, however, they remain concealed by day, committing their depredations by night. In some sections, as the low country of Badulla, the villagers build moats or ditches about their huts to protect themselves from the rogues.

Certain localities seem to be infested by these creatures. Thus, in 1847, a dangerous rogue frequented the Rangbodde Pass on a mountain road, that led to the Sanitarium at Neuera-ellia, and demoralized the entire country so that people were afraid to undertake the pass unless in numbers. Its method of attack was to seize natives, as it did a Caffre of the Caffre Corps of pioneers, with its trunk, and beat the victim to death against the bank.

Some years ago a native trader and party were travelling near Idalgasinna, when they suddenly heard the shrill trumpeting of a rogue. The entire company took to their heels; the coolies casting away their goods, and making for the jungle. The trader himself hid behind a large rock, and saw the elephant seize one of the coolies, and, after carrying him a short distance, dash him to the ground, and trample upon him; then turning to the goods they carried, he tore them in pieces, after which he walked into the jungle. This elephant was a noted rogue, and in its time destroyed the lives of a number of people. He was finally killed by an English sportsman.

A native made a statement to a Singhalese gentleman, who in turn imparted the information to Sir Emerson Tennent, that once, when he was on his way to Badulla, and walking around a hill, a large elephant rushed upon his party without warning, trumpeting loudly. In a moment, he had seized the native’s companion, who, it happened, was in the rear, and killed him by hurling him to the ground. Dropping the first victim, he then seized the narrator of the incident, and hurled him aloft with such force that he landed in the branches of a cahata-tree, and lodged there, thus escaping with only a dislocation of the wrist. The elephant returned to the body upon the ground, and tore it limb from limb, mutilating it as much as possible.

Rogue elephants in Ceylon are often very mischievous. In some sections, the tracing-pegs that have been put down by surveyors during one day, are pulled up the next by elephants. Rogues, like other elephants, are very suspicious. Col. Hardy, at one time deputy quartermaster-general in Ceylon, was travelling to an outpost in the south-eastern portion of the island, and one day became lost, and was attacked at dusk by a rogue. He ran for cover, but was almost caught, when he happened to think of his dressing-case; and, throwing it down, his pursuer came to an immediate stand-still, stopping to examine it carefully, while the officer escaped.

Other rogues destroy every thing they can find. In “The Colombo Observer” of March, 1858, there was a reward of twenty-five guineas offered for the destruction of an elephant that had taken up its residence in the Rajawallé coffee-plantation near Kandy. The huge animal terrified the people for miles about; its plan being, to come out of the jungle at night, and pull down buildings and trees on the plantation. It seemed to have an especial spite for the pipes of the water-works, the pillars of which it tore down; while the tops were all destroyed by this curious animal, who was finally shot.