In the Hambangtotte country, where the Singhalese domesticate the buffaloes, and use them to assist in the labour of the rice lands, the villagers are much annoyed by the wild ones, which mingle with the tame when sent out to the woods to pasture; and it constantly happens that a savage stranger, placing himself at the head of the tame herd, resists the attempts of the owners to drive them homewards at sunset.  In the districts of Putlam and the Seven Corles, buffaloes are generally used for draught; and in carrying heavy loads of salt from the coast towards the interior, they drag a cart over roads which would defy the weaker strength of bullocks.

In one place between Batticaloa and Trincomalie I found the natives making an ingenious use of them when engaged in shooting water-fowl in the vast salt marshes and muddy lakes.  Being an object to which the birds are accustomed, the Singhalese train the buffalo to the sport, and, concealed behind, the animal browsing listlessly along, they guide it by ropes attached to its horns, and thus creep undiscovered within shot of the flock.  The same practice prevails, I believe, in some of the northern parts of India, where they are similarly trained to assist the sportsman in approaching deer.  One of these “sporting buffaloes” sells for a considerable sum.

The buffalo, like the elk, is sometimes found in Ceylon as an albino, with purely white hair and pink iris.  There is a peculiarity in the formation of its foot, which, though it must have attracted attention, I have never seen mentioned by naturalists.  It is equivalent to an arrangement that distinguishes the foot of the reindeer from that of the stag and the antelope.  In them, the hoofs, being constructed for lightness and flight, are compact and vertical; but, in the reindeer, the joints of the tarsal bones admit of lateral expansion, and the broad hoofs curve upwards in front, while the two secondary ones behind (which are but slightly developed in the fallow deer and others of the same family) are prolonged till, in certain positions, they are capable of being applied to the ground, thus adding to the circumference and sustaining power of the foot.  It has been usually suggested as the probable design of this structure, that it is to enable the reindeer to shovel under the snow in order to reach the lichens beneath it; but I apprehend that another use of it has been overlooked, that of facilitating its movements in search of food by increasing the difficulty of its sinking in the snow.

A formation precisely analogous in the buffalo seems to point to a corresponding design.  The ox, whose life is spent on firm ground, has the bones of the foot so constructed as to afford the most solid support to an animal of its great weight; but in the buffalo, which delights in the morasses on the margins of pools and rivers, the formation of the foot resembles that of the reindeer.  The tarsi in front extend almost horizontally from the upright bones of the leg, and