Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and Topographical with Notices of Its Natural History Part 16

[Footnote 2: In the Museum of the College of Surgeons, London (No. 4362 A), there is a cranium of a jackal which exhibits this strange osseous process on the super-occipital; and I have placed along with it a specimen of the h.o.r.n.y sheath, which was presented to me by Mr.

Lavalliere, the district judge of Kandy.]

Jackals are subject to hydrophobia, and instances are frequent of cattle being bitten by them and dying in consequence.

_The Mongoos_.--Of the Mongoos or Ichneumons five species have been described; and one which frequents the hills near Neuera-ellia[1], is so remarkable from its bushy fur, that the invalid soldiers in the sanatarium, to whom it is familiar, call it the "Ceylon Badger." I have found universally that the natives of Ceylon attach no credit to the European story of the Mongoos (_H. griseus_) resorting to some plant, which no one has yet succeeded in identifying, as an antidote against the bite of the venomous serpents on which it preys. There is no doubt that in its conflicts with the cobra de capello and other poisonous snakes, which it attacks with as little hesitation as the harmless ones, it may be seen occasionally to retreat, and even to retire into the jungle, and, it is added, to eat some vegetable; but a gentleman who has been a frequent observer of its exploits, a.s.sures me that most usually the herb it resorted to was gra.s.s; and if this were not at hand, almost any other that grew near seemed equally acceptable. Hence has probably arisen the long list of plants; such as the _Ophioxylon serpentinum_ and _Ophiorhiza mungos_, the _Aristolochia Indica_, the _Mimosa octandru_, and others, each of which has been a.s.serted to be the ichneumon's specific; whilst their multiplicity is demonstrative of the non-existence of any one in particular to which the animal resorts for an antidote. Were there any truth in the tale as regards the mongoos, it would be difficult to understand, why other creatures, such as the secretary bird and the falcon, which equally destroy serpents, should be left defenceless, and the ichneumon alone provided with a prophylactic.

Besides, were the ichneumon inspired by that courage which would result from the consciousness of security, it would be so indifferent to the bite of the serpent, that we might conclude that, both in its approaches and its a.s.sault, it would be utterly careless as to the precise mode of its attack. Such, however, is far from being the case; and next to its audacity, nothing is more surprising than the adroitness with which it escapes the spring of the snake under a due sense of danger, and the cunning with which it makes its arrangements to leap upon the back and fasten its teeth in the head of the cobra. It is this display of instinctive ingenuity that Lucan[2] celebrates where he paints the ichneumon diverting the attention of the asp, by the motion of his bushy tale, and then seizing it in the midst of its confusion.

[Footnote 1: _Herpestes vitticollis_. Mr. W. ELLIOTT, in his _Catalogue of Mammalia found in the Southern Maharata Country_, Madras, 1840, says, that "One specimen of this Herpestes was procured by accident in the Ghat forests in 1829, and is now deposited in the British Museum; it is very rare, inhabiting only the thickest woods, and its habits are very little known," p. 9. In Ceylon, it is comparatively common.]

[Footnote 2: The pa.s.sage in Lucan is a versification of the same narrative related by Pliny, lib. viii. ch. 35; and aelian, lib. iii. ch.

22.]

"Aspidas ut Pharias cauda solertior hostis Ludit, et iratas incerta provocat umbra: Obliquusque caput vanas serpentis in auras Effusae toto comprendit guttura morsu Letiferam citra saniem; tune irrita pestis Exprimitur, faucesque fluunt pereunte veneno."

_Pharsalia_, lib. iv. v. 729.

The mystery of the mongoos and its antidote has been referred to the supposition that there may be some peculiarity in its organisation which renders it _proof against_ the poison of the serpent. It remains for future investigation to determine how far this conjecture is founded in truth; and whether in the blood of the mongoos there exists any element or quality which acts as a prophylactic. Such exceptional provisions are not without precedent in the animal oeconomy: the hornbill feeds with impunity on the deadly fruit of the strychnos; the milky juice of some species of euphorbia, which is harmless to oxen, is invariably fatal to the zebra; and the tsetse fly, the pest of South Africa, whose bite is mortal to the ox, the dog, and the horse, is harmless to man and the untamed creatures of the forest.[1]

[Footnote 1: Dr. LIVINGSTONE, _Tour in S. Africa_, p. 80. Is it a fact that in America, pigs extirpate the rattlesnakes with impunity?]

The Singhalese distinguish one species of mongoos, which they designate "_Hotambeya_," and which they a.s.sert never preys upon serpents. A writer in the _Ceylon Miscellany_ mentions, that they are often to be seen "crossing rivers and frequenting mud-brooks near Chilaw; the adjacent thickets affording them shelter, and their food consisting of aquatic reptiles, crabs, and mollusca."[1]

[Footnote 1: This is possibly the "musbilai" or mouse-cat of Behar, which preys upon birds and fish. Could it be the Urva of the Nepalese (_Urva cancrivora_, Hodgson), which Mr. Hodgson describes as dwelling in burrows, and being carnivorous and ranivorous?--Vide _Journ. As. Soc.

Beng._, vol. vi. p. 56.]

IV. RODENTIA. _Squirrels_.--Smaller animals in great numbers enliven the forests and lowland plains with their graceful movements. Squirrels[1], of which there are a great variety, make their shrill metallic call heard at early morning in the woods, and when sounding their note of warning on the approach of a civet or a tree-snake, the ears tingle with the loud trill of defiance, which rings as clear and rapid as the running down of an alarum, and is instantly caught up and re-echoed from every side by their terrified playmates.

[Footnote 1: Of two kinds which frequent the mountains, one which is peculiar to Ceylon was discovered by Mr. Edgar L. Layard, who has done me the honour to call it the _Sciurus Tennentii_. Its dimensions are large, measuring upwards of two feet from head to tail. It is distinguished from the _S. macrurus_ by the predominant black colour of the upper surface of the body, with the exception of a rusty spot at the base of the ears.]

One of the largest, belonging to a closely allied subgenus, is known as the "Flying Squirrel,"[1] from its being a.s.sisted in its prodigious leaps from tree to tree, by the parachute formed by the skin of the flanks, which on the extension of the limbs front and rear, is laterally expanded from foot to foot. Thus buoyed up in its descent, the spring which it is enabled to make from one lofty tree to another resembles the flight of a bird rather than the bound of a quadruped. Of these pretty creatures there are two species, one common to Ceylon and India, the other (_Sciuropterus Layardii_, Kelaart) is peculiar to the island, and is by far the most beautiful of the family.

[Footnote 1: Pteromys oral., _Tickel_. P. petaurista, _Pallas_.]

_Rats_.--Among the multifarious inhabitants to which the forest affords at once a home and provender is the tree rat[1], which forms its nest on the branches, and by turns makes its visits to the dwellings of the natives, frequenting the ceilings in preference to the lower parts of houses. Here it is incessantly followed by the rat-snake[2], whose domestication is encouraged by the native servants, in consideration of its services in destroying vermin. I had one day an opportunity of surprising a snake which had just seized on a rat of this description, and of covering it suddenly with a gla.s.s shade, before it had time to swallow its prey. The serpent, which appeared stunned by its own capture, allowed the rat to escape from its jaws, which cowered at one side of the gla.s.s in the most pitiable state of trembling terror. The two were left alone for some moments, and on my return to them the snake was as before in the same att.i.tude of sullen stupor. On setting them at liberty, the rat bounded towards the nearest fence; but quick as lightning it was followed by its pursuer, which seized it before it could gain the hedge, through which I saw the snake glide with its victim in its jaws.

[Footnote 1: There are two species of the tree rat in Ceylon: M.

rufescens, _Gray_; (M. flavescens; _Elliot_;) and Mus nemoralis, _Blyth_.]

[Footnote 2: Coryphodon Blumenbachii.]

Another indigenous variety of the rat is that which made its appearance for the first time in the coffee plantations on the Kandyan hills in the year 1847, and in such swarms does it infest them, that as many as a thousand have been killed in a single day on one estate. In order to reach the buds and blossoms of the coffee, it cuts such slender branches, as would not sustain its weight, and feeds as they fall to the ground; and so delicate and sharp are its incisors, that the twigs thus destroyed are detached by as clean a cut as if severed with a knife. The coffee-rat[1] is an insular variety of the _Mus hirsutus_ of W. Elliot, found in Southern India. They inhabit the forests, making their nests among the roots of the trees, and like the lemmings of Norway and Lapland, they migrate in vast numbers on the occurrence of a scarcity of their ordinary food. The Malabar coolies are so fond of their flesh, that they evince a preference for those districts in which the coffee plantations are subject to these incursions, where they fry the rats in oil, or convert them into curry.

[Footnote 1: Golunda Ellioti, _Gray_.]

_Bandicoot_.--Another favourite article of food with the coolies is the pig-rat or Bandicoot[1], which attains on those hills the weight of two or three pounds, and grows to nearly the length of two feet. As it feeds on grain and roots, its flesh is said to be delicate, and much resembling young pork. Its nests, when rifled, are frequently found to contain considerable quant.i.ties of rice, stored up against the dry season.

[Footnote 1: Mus bandicota, _Beckst_. The English term bandicoot is a corruption of the Telinga name _pandikoku_, literally _pig-rat_.]

_Porcupine_.--The Porcupine[1] is another of the _rodentia_ which has drawn down upon itself the hostility of the planters, from its destruction of the young coco-nut palms, to which it is a pernicious and persevering, but withal so crafty, a visitor, that it is with difficulty any trap can be so disguised, or any bait made so alluring, as to lead to its capture. The usual expedient is to place some of its favourite food at the extremity of a trench, so narrow as to prevent the porcupine turning, whilst the direction of his quills effectually bars his retreat. On a newly planted coco-nut tope, at Hang-welle, within a few miles of Colombo, I have heard of as many as twenty-seven being thus captured in a single night; but such success is rare. The more ordinary expedient is to smoke them out by burning straw at the apertures of their burrows. The flesh is esteemed a delicacy in Ceylon, and in consistency, colour, and flavour, it very much resembles that of a young pig.

[Footnote 1: Hystrix leucurus, _Sykes_.]

V. EDENTATA, _Pengolin._--Of the _Edentata_ the only example in Ceylon is the scaly ant-eater, called by the Singhalese, Caballaya, but usually known by its Malay name of _Pengolin_[1], a word indicative of its faculty of "rolling itself up" into a compact ball, by bending its head towards its stomach, arching its back into a circle, and securing all by a powerful fold of its mail-covered tail. The feet of the pengolin are armed with powerful claws, which they double in in walking like the ant-eater of Brazil. These they use in extracting their favourite food, the termites, from ant-hills and decaying wood. When at liberty, they burrow in the dry ground to a depth of seven or eight feet, where they reside in pairs, and produce annually one or two young.

[Footnote 1: Manis pentadactyla, _Linn._]

Of two specimens which I kept alive at different times, one from the vicinity of Kandy, about two feet in length, was a gentle and affectionate creature, which, after wandering over the house in search of ants, would attract attention to its wants by climbing up my knee, laying hold of my leg with its prehensile tail. The other, more than double that length, was caught in the jungle near Chilaw, and brought to me in Colombo. I had always understood that the pengolin was unable to climb trees; but the one last mentioned frequently ascended a tree in my garden, in search of ants, and this it effected by means of its hooked feet, aided by an oblique grasp of the tail. The ants it seized by extending its round and glutinous tongue along their tracks. In both, the scales of the back were a cream-coloured white, with a tinge of red in the specimen which came from Chilaw, probably acquired by the insinuation of the Cabook dust which abounds along the western coast of the island. Generally speaking, they were quiet during the day, and grew restless as evening and night approached.

VI. RUMINATA. _The Gaur._--Besides the deer and some varieties of the humped ox, which have been introduced from the opposite continent of India, Ceylon has probably but one other indigenous _ruminant_., the buffalo.[1] There is a tradition that the gaur, found in the extremity of the Indian peninsula, was at one period a native of the Kandyan mountains; but as Knox speaks of one which in his time "was kept among the king's creatures" at Kandy[2], and his account of it tallies with that of the _Bos Gaurus_ of Hindustan, it would appear even then to have been a rarity. A place between Neuera-ellia and Adam's Peak bears the name of Gowra-ellia, and it is not impossible that the animal may yet be discovered in some of the imperfectly explored regions of the island.[3]

I have heard of an instance in which a very old Kandyan, residing in the mountains near the Horton Plains, a.s.serted that when young he had seen what he believed to have been a gaur, and which he described as between an elk and a buffalo in size, dark brown in colour, and very scantily provided with hair.

[Footnote 1: Bubalus buffelus; _Gray_.]

[Footnote 2: _Historical Relation of Ceylon, &c._, A.D. 1681. Book i. c, 6.]

[Footnote 3: KELAART, _Fauna Zeylan_., p. 87.]

_Oxen_.--Oxen are used by the peasantry both in ploughing and in tempering the mud in the wet paddi fields before sowing the rice; and when the harvest is reaped they "tread out the corn," after the immemorial custom of the East. The wealth of the native chiefs and landed proprietors frequently consists in their herds of bullocks, which they hire out to their dependents during the seasons for agricultural labour; and as they already supply them with land to be tilled, and lend the seed which is to crop it, the further contribution of this portion of the labour serves to render the dependence of the peasantry on the chiefs and head-men complete.

The cows are worked equally with the oxen; and as the calves are always permitted to suck them, milk is an article which the traveller can rarely hope to procure in a Kandyan village. From their constant exposure at all seasons, the cattle in Ceylon, both those employed in agriculture and on the roads, are subject to the most devastating murrains, which sweep them away by thousands. So frequent is the recurrence of these calamities, and so extended their ravages, that they exercise a serious influence over the commercial interests of the colony, by reducing the facilities of agriculture, and augmenting the cost of carriage during the most critical periods of the coffee season.

A similar disorder, probably peripneumonia, frequently carries off the cattle in a.s.sam and other hill countries on the continent of India; and there, as in Ceylon, the inflammatory symptoms in the lungs and throat, and the internal derangement and external eruptive appearances, seem to indicate that the disease is a feverish influenza, attributable to neglect and exposure in a moist and variable climate; and that its prevention might be hoped for, and the cattle preserved by the simple expedient of more humane and considerate treatment, especially by affording them cover at night.

During my residence in Ceylon an incident occurred at Neuera-ellia, which invested one of these pretty animals with an heroic interest. A little cow, belonging to an English gentleman, was housed, together with her calf, near the dwelling of her owner, and being aroused during the night by her furious bellowing, the servants, on hastening to the stall, found her goring a leopard, which had stolen in to attack the calf. She had got him into a corner, and whilst lowing incessantly to call for help, she continued to pound him with her horns. The wild animal, apparently stupified by her unexpected violence, was detained by her till despatched by a gun.

_The Buffalo_.--Buffaloes abound in all parts of Ceylon, but they are only to be seen in their native wildness in the vast solitudes of the northern and eastern provinces, where rivers, lagoons, and dilapidated tanks abound. In these they delight to immerse themselves, till only their heads appear above the surface; or, enveloped in mud to protect themselves from the a.s.saults of insects, luxuriate in the long sedges by the water margins.

When the buffalo is browsing, a crow will frequently be seen stationed on his back, engaged in freeing it from the ticks and other pests which attach themselves to his leathery hide, the smooth brown surface of which, unprotected by hair, s.h.i.+nes with an unpleasant polish in the sunlight. When in motion he throws back his clumsy head till the huge horns rest on his shoulders, and the nose is presented in a line with the eyes. When wild they are at all times uncertain in disposition, but so frequently savage that it is never quite safe to approach them, if disturbed in their pasture or alarmed from their repose in the shallow lakes. On such occasions they hurry into line, draw up in defensive array, with a few of the oldest bulls in advance; and, wheeling in circles, their horns clas.h.i.+ng with a loud sound as they clank them together in their rapid evolutions, the herd betakes itself to flight.

Then forming again at a safer distance, they halt as before, elevating their nostrils, and throwing back their heads to take a cautious survey of the intruders. The sportsman rarely molests them, so huge a creature affording no worthy mark for his skill, and their wanton slaughter adding nothing to the supply of food for their a.s.sailant.

In the Hambangtotte country, where the Singhalese domesticate the buffaloes, and use them to a.s.sist in the labour of the rice lands, the villagers are much annoyed by the wild ones, which mingle with the tame when sent out to the woods to pasture; and it constantly happens that a savage stranger, placing himself at the head of the tame herd, resists the attempts of the owners to drive them homewards at sunset. In the districts of Putlam and the Seven Corles, buffaloes are generally used for draught; and in carrying heavy loads of salt from the coast towards the interior, they drag a cart over roads which would defy the weaker strength of bullocks.

In one place between Batticaloa and Trincomalie I found the natives making an ingenious use of them when engaged in shooting water-fowl in the vast salt marshes and muddy lakes. Being an object to which the birds are accustomed, the Singhalese train the buffalo to the sport, and, concealed behind, the animal browsing listlessly along, they guide it by ropes attached to its horns, and thus creep undiscovered within shot of the flock. The same practice prevails, I believe, in some of the northern parts of India, where they are similarly trained to a.s.sist the sportsman in approaching deer. One of these "sporting buffaloes" sells for a considerable sum.

The buffalo, like the elk, is sometimes found in Ceylon as an albino, with purely white hair and pink iris. There is a peculiarity in the formation of its foot, which, though it must have attracted attention, I have never seen mentioned by naturalists. It is equivalent to an arrangement that distinguishes the foot of the reindeer from that of the stag and the antelope. In them, the hoofs, being constructed for lightness and flight, are compact and vertical; but, in the reindeer, the joints of the tarsal bones admit of lateral expansion, and the broad hoofs curve upwards in front, while the two secondary ones behind (which are but slightly developed in the fallow deer and others of the same family) are prolonged till, in certain positions, they are capable of being applied to the ground, thus adding to the circ.u.mference and sustaining power of the foot. It has been usually suggested as the probable design of this structure, that it is to enable the reindeer to shovel under the snow in order to reach the lichens beneath it; but I apprehend that another use of it has been overlooked, that of facilitating its movements in search of food by increasing the difficulty of its sinking in the snow.

A formation precisely a.n.a.logous in the buffalo seems to point to a corresponding design. The ox, whose life is spent on firm ground, has the bones of the foot so constructed as to afford the most solid support to an animal of its great weight; but in the buffalo, which delights in the mora.s.ses on the margins of pools and rivers, the formation of the foot resembles that of the reindeer. The tarsi in front extend almost horizontally from the upright bones of the leg, and spread widely on touching the ground; the hoofs are flattened and broad, with the extremities turned upwards; and the false hoofs descend behind till, in walking, they make a clattering sound. In traversing the marshes, this combination of abnormal incidents serves to give extraordinary breadth to the foot, and not only prevents the buffalo from sinking inconveniently in soft ground[1], but at the same time presents no obstacle to the withdrawal of his foot from the mud.

[Footnote 1: PROFESSOR OWEN has noticed a similar fact regarding the rudiments of the second and fifth digits in the instance of the elk and bison, which have them largely expanded where they inhabit swampy ground; whilst they are nearly obliterated in the camel and dromedary, which traverse arid deserts.--OWEN _on Limbs_, p. 34; see also BELL _on the Hand_, ch. iii.]

_Deer_.--"Deer," says the truthful old chronicler, Robert Knox, "are in great abundance in the woods, from the largeness of a cow to the smallness of a hare, for here is a creature in this land no bigger than the latter, though every part rightly resembleth a deer: it is called _meminna_, of a grey colour, with white spots and good meat."[1] The little creature which thus dwelt in the recollection of the old man, as one of the memorials of his long captivity, is the small "musk deer"[2]

so called in India, although neither s.e.x is provided with a musk-bag; and the Europeans in Ceylon know it by the name of the moose deer. Its extreme length never reaches two feet; and of those which were domesticated about my house, few exceeded ten inches in height, their graceful limbs being of similar delicate proportion. It possesses long and extremely large tusks, with which it inflicts a severe bite. The interpreter moodliar of Negombo had a _milk white_ meminna in 1847, which he designed to send home as an acceptable present to Her Majesty, but it was unfortunately killed by an accident.[3]

[Footnote 1: KNOX'S _Relation, &c_., book i. c. 6.]

[Footnote 2: Moschus meminna.]

[Footnote 3: When the English took possession of Kandy, in 1803, they found "five beautiful milk-white deer in the palace, which was noted as a very extraordinary thing."--_Letter_ in Appendix to PERCIVAL'S _Ceylon_, p. 428. The writer does not say of what species they were.]