ee days' journey to Oomanoo, which was certainly some where
in the very centre of the Veddah country; and our quaint little guide
had never even heard of the Batticaloa road. There was no doubt,
therefore, that it was a long way from Oomanoo, which village might be
any distance from us, as a Veddah's description of a day's journey might
vary from ten to thirty miles.

I certainly looked forward to a short allowance of food both for
ourselves and coolies. We had been hurrying through the country at such
a rate that we had killed no deer; we had, therefore, been living
upon our tins of preserved provisions, of which we had now only four
remaining.

At the village of Monampitya there was no rice procurable, as the
natives lived entirely upon korrakan* (*A small seed, which they make
into hard, uneatable cakes.), at which our coolies turned up their noses
when I advised them to lay in a stock before starting.

There was no time to be lost, and we determined to push on as fast as
the coolies could follow, as they had only two days' provisions; we had
precisely the same, and those could not be days of feasting. We were, in
fact, like sailors going to sea with a ship only half-victualled; and,
as we followed our little guide, and lost sight of the village behind
us, I foresaw that our stomachs would suffer unless game was plentiful
on the path.

We passed through beautiful open country for about eight miles, during
which we saw several herds of deer; but we could not get a shot.
At length we pitched the tent, at four o'clock P.M., at the foot of
'Gunner's Coin,' a solitary rocky mountain of about two thousand feet
in height, which rises precipitously from the level country. We then
divided into two parties--W. and P., and V. B. and I. We strolled off
with our guns in different directions.

The country was perfectly level, being a succession of glades of fine
low grass divided into a thousand natural paddocks by belts of jungle.

We were afraid to stroll more than a mile from the tent, lest we should
lose our way; and we took a good survey of the most prominent points of
the mountain, that we might know our direction by their position.

After an hour's walk, and just as the sun was setting, a sudden crash in
a jungle a few yards from us brought the rifles upon full cock. The next
moment out came an elephant's head, and I knocked him over by a front
shot. He had held his head in such a peculiar position that a ball
could