Some Persons Prefer The Latter To Rifles For Elephant-Shooting, But I Cannot Myself Understand Why A Decidedly Imperfect Weapon Should Be Used When The Rifle Offers Such Superior Advantages.

At twenty and even thirty paces a good smooth-bore will carry a ball with nearly the same precision as a rifle; but in a country full of various large game there is no certainty, when the ball is rammed down, at what object it is to be aimed.

A buffalo or deer may cross the path at a hundred yards, and the smooth-bore is useless; on the other hand, the rifle is always ready for whatever may appear.

My battery consists of one four-ounce rifle (a single barrel) weighing twenty-one pounds, one long two-ounce rifle (single barrel) weighing sixteen pounds, and four double-barrelled rifles, No. 10 weighing each fifteen pounds. Smooth-bores I count for nothing, although I have frequently used them.

So much for guns. It may therefore be summed up that the proper battery for Ceylon shooting would be four large-bored double-barrelled rifles, say from No. 10 to No. 12 in size, but all to be the same bore, so as to prevent confusion in loading. Persons may suit their own fancy as to the weight of their guns, bearing in mind that single barrels are very useless things.

Next to the `Rifle' in the order of description comes the 'Hound.'

The `elk' is his acknowledged game, and an account of this animal's size and strength will prove the necessity of a superior breed of hound.

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