In the chapter on Continental Asiatic Elephants, the distinguishing points of elephants are given. In Ceylon, they differ again; and in a Singhalese work, the “Hastisilpe,” which treats of the management of these animals, the author says an inferior elephant (one that corresponds probably to the Meerga caste) has “eyes restless like those of a crow, the hair of the head mixed shades, the nails short and green, the ears small, the neck thin, the skin freckled, the tail without a tuft, and the fore-quarters lean and low.” The perfect type, corresponding to the Koomeriah grade of India, is characterized by “softness of the skin, the red color of the mouth and tongue, the forehead expanded and hollow, the ears broad and rectangular, the trunk broad at the root, and blotched with pink in front, the eyes bright and kindly, the cheeks large, the neck full, the back level, the chest square, the fore-legs short, and convex in front, the hindquarter plump, and five nails on each foot, all smooth, polished, and round.” An elephant with these perfections, says the same author, “will impart glory and magnificence to the king: but he cannot be discovered among thousands; yea, there shall never be found an elephant clothed at once with all the excellences here described.” The noises which Ceylon elephants utter, while undoubtedly identical with those of India and Bengal, seem to have a rather different meaning imputed to them. The shrill cry uttered through the trunk is indicative of rage, and is generally given when the animal is rushing upon its adversary. When the attention of an individual elephant of a herd is attracted by any unusual object, the intelligence is conveyed to the others by a low, suppressed sound, uttered by the lips, and compared by hunters to the word “prut,” or the twittering of a bird. Major Macready, military secretary of Ceylon, describes a sound that he heard made by a wild elephant as “a sort of a banging noise, like a cooper hammering a cask,” produced, he believes, by the animal striking its sides rapidly with its trunk. It may have been made, as has been previously described, by striking the tip of the trunk against the ground.