248 ELEPHANTS : THE KING OF ACHlN book iii
of
Ceylon are more highly esteemed than the elephants of other countries,
because they are more courageous in war; and there is not a King in
India who does not desire to have one. I may here state a fact which
some may find it difficult to believe, but it is nevertheless quite
true ; it is that when any king or noble possesses one of these Ceylon
elephants, and others are brought into its presence from the places
where the merchants obtain them, such as Achin, Siam, Arakan, Pegu, the
Kingdom of Bhutan, the Kingdom of Assam, the territories of Cochin and
the coast of Melinde,1 as soon as these latter elephants see
one of Ceylon, by a natural instinct they pay it reverence by placing
the ends of their trunks on the ground, and then raising them.2
It is true that the elephants which the great nobles keep, when brought
before them to be examined whether they are in good condition, make a
sort of salute thrice with their trunk. This I have often seen ; but
they are trained to it, and their masters teach them to do it when
young.
The
King of Achin, with whom the Dutch failed to keep their promise, had
other means for revenging himself than by the aid of the King of Kandy,
because the Dutch were not allowed to ship the pepper which comes from
his territories ; for a long time he refused them permission, and even
1
This reference to Malinda would seem to imply that the African elephant
was domesticated in Tavemier's time (see vol. i. 221): but this is
doubtful.
2
Sir Emerson Tennent, alluding to the common belief that Tavernier had
made a statement to this effect, adds that ' a reference to the
original shows that Tavemier's observations are not only fanciful in
themselves but are restricted to the supposed excellence of the Ceylon"
animal in war'. This statement is simply incomprehensible, since
Tavemier's original passage, which is here translated, is quoted in
full in a footnote on the same page (Ceylon, ii. 380). Fryer
(i. 73) also says that the Ceylon elephants exact homage from all
others, which prostrate themselves submissively before them. In
reference to the fact that the elephants of Sumatra have points of
affinity with the Ceylon variety, it has been suggested that the
original stock of the Sumatra elephants was introduced in a
domesticated condition from Ceylon. It is on record that some elephants
sent as a present to the Sultan of Sulu (or Soolo) by the East India
Company, as he was unable to maintain them, were let loose on Cape
Unsang in Borneo. (Hornaday, Two Years in the JungU, 220.)
