Litchfield enquirer., 1880-02-19

TIGERS AND ELEPHANTS 1780- -90.- Ten years after the famine of 1770 once pOpu'ous district was silent jungle; and in 1780 small body of Sepoys could with diffi- culty force it's way through its forests. For 12O miles, says an witness they march ed through but an extensive wood, all the way aperfect wilderness; some times a small vl- lage presented itself in the midst of these jungles, with little cultivated ground around it, hardly sufficient to encamp the two battal
 ions. These woods abound with tigers and bears, which infested the camp every night, but did no other damage than carrying off a child aud killing some of the gentlemen's bag gage -bullocks. As the rural communities re- linquished their hamlets and drew closer to- gether toward the centre of district, the wild beasts pressed hungrily on their rear. In vain the East India Company offered reward for each tigers head sufficient to maintain a peas ants family in comfort for months an item of outlay which our officers deemed SO im- portant, that when, in the financial crisis of 179O-91, the Treasury had to suspend all pay ments. and it made the tiger money and diet allowance for prisoners the sole exceptions to the rule. In vain it spent the whole land rev. enue of frontier district in rewards for kill ing wild beasts A belt of jungle filled with ferocious animals lay for years around the cul tivated land. The official records frequently speak of the mailbag being carried off by tigers. and the custom of the mail-runrlers carrying dangling rings or bells to scare away the wild beasts survived to our own day Lord COrnwallis, in 17S9, had to sanction grant of public money to free the military road from the depredations of these animals
 The ravages of the wild elephants were on larger scale, and their extermination formed one of the most important duties of the Brit tish officers after the country passed under our rule. Tigers, leopards, and wolves slew their thousands of men and their hundreds of thou sands of cattle. But the herd of wild ele- plants was absolutely resistless, lifting off roofs, pushing down walls, trampling a viii. lage under foot as if it were a city of sand which child had built upon the shore In two parishes alone, during the last few years of the native administration 56 hamlets with their surrounding lands Chad all been destroy ed and gone to jungle, caused by the depreda- tions of wild elephants" Another official re-
 turn states that 40 market villages throughout Birbhum district had been deserted from the same cause. Large reductions had to be made in the landtax, and the East India Company borrowed tame elephants from the native Viceroy's stud in order to catch the wild ones. had peculiar proof on my journey" writes an English officer in 1791, "of their ravages
 The poor timid native ties his cot in tree, to which he retires when the elephants approach, and silently views the destruction of his cot. tage and the whole profits of his labor" one night, writes an English surveyor in 1910, although had guard, the men of the viii lage close to my tent retired to the trees, and the women hid themselves among the cattle, leaving their huts prey to the el phants, who know very we'll where to look for grain. Two nights before some of them had unroofed hut in the village, and had eaten up all the grain whicha poor family possessed" "Most fortunately for the population of the last cen- tury. '' they delight in the sequestered range of the mountains; if they preferred the plain, whole kingdoms would be laid waste The COrnIiu MaoGzine