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On a vanished trail to Mahiyangana
Cecil D. Dharmasena recalls his adventures in the Mahiyangana forests and Veddah country
It was around midnight and we were silently seated on the large rock, while a bright full moon in a clear starlit sky lit up the whole landscape below. This was an abandoned stone quarry just outside of Mahiyangana town, but the whole area was thick jungle back then. Sitting on the rock in the moonlight, our ‘quarry’ was a lone elephant that was supposed to come there every night.

Presently, we heard the ‘crack’ of a branch being broken. Our ‘quarry’ had arrived and excitedly, we waited. Half an hour later, it walked into view; a huge bull, its usually dull and dirty grey-brown hide almost shining in the moonlight. From atop the rock, we watched spellbound, as it fed leisurely. Eventually, it walked up to the pool of water directly below us and drank its fill, not forgetting to spray a few trunkfuls onto its broad back. Gradually it moved away, and while we silently slipped down the rock, I could yet hear it feeding in the dark forest.

Fifty years ago, there was no bridge across the Mahaweli at Mahiyangana. The small hamlet of Weragantota, where one could board the ferry to get across to the ancient Mahiyangana temple, was a dead-end. People travelled to Bibile, and beyond to the east through Badulla, and that was a long and exhausting journey; an overnight trip by the night upcountry train with sleeping car.

A visit to the Mahiyangana temple in the early 1950s almost ended in tragedy. It took all day to do the long journey from Kandy, down the famous 17 hairpin bends, which had to be negotiated with extreme care. The small resthouse at Weragantota was our destination, it being the ferry point across the Mahaweli. The Mahiyangana dagoba was then a mound of broken bricks, and since it was a poya festival, a large crowd was waiting to get across.

After the festivities were over, it was past 8 p.m. and we all came down to the river. The ferry men seemed to have retired for the night and quite a crowd collected, shouting for the ferries parked on the far side to come over. Finally, one ferry came across and in spite of the entreaties of the boatmen that only 15 can be carried safely, over twice that number scrambled abroad, along with us. Soon after take-off, the hollow logs supporting the ferry filled up with water and the whole contraption sank, throwing us all overboard into the fast flowing, crocodile infested, muddy water. Fortunately, a major tragedy was averted with everyone managing to scramble ashore, muddied, soaked and shivering in the night breeze.

Some years later, the Mahiyangana bridge across the Mahaweli was being constructed, and eight of us Agriculture students at the Peradeniya University, decided to cycle down for a long weekend with an engineer (brother of a batch-mate) at the bridge site. The ride down those 17 hairpins was tough and eventful, none of the bikes having any brakes.

Dambana was a tiny Veddah settlement in those days, and we drove there in the construction engineer's vehicle. The late Veddah Chief Tissahamy was quite a young man then, and I remember he wanted two shiny one rupee coins (not notes), which he referred to as ridee pochcha, for a deer skin. They did a Veddah dance to entertain us. There were no tourists or other visitors in those times, and the approach to Dambana was a narrow cart track.
Many years later with the advent of the Mahaweli scheme, most of these Veddahs were trans-located to Henanigala village in System C, near Dehiattakandiya. But some who could not fit into a settled agricultural routine, moved back to Dambana.

Before the Mahaweli project commenced, the area north of Ulhitiya oya up to Manampitiya on the Polonnaruwa-Batticaloa Road, was a blank region on the map. It was thick, impenetrable jungle with no access. In the early 1970s, I had to work at Alutharama Research Station, about 15 km north of Mahiyangana, and part of the area from there on up to the Ulhitiya oya was opened up as special lease farms. From the Manager's bungalow atop a hill, we would sit out on the verandah in the evening, watching the large herds of elephants walking through the maize crop along their old jungle trails, down to the Mahaweli. Gradually their incursions stopped when the area became more populated.

Further up the road towards Hembarawa village was the Brown and Co. farm at Serapitiya, which was really an old villu. Many a time we would go around this villu by tractor in the late evening. It was quite thrilling to stand up on the trailer, and get quite close to the large herds of elephants that came to feed on the villu grass at the far end.

One evening, we decided to take the tractor across the Ulhitiya to see the villus, which were said to be there. We had selected a bright full moon night, and we took several men and some lanterns and provisions with us. Crossing the Ulhitiya oya at a steep fording point, we went along a narrow jungle track, which was said to be the ancient road along the Mahaweli from Ruhuna to Anuradhapura, used by King Dutugemunu and his armies. Although no vehicle ever used this track, it appeared to be in quite good shape.

Coming to a spot where divul (wood apple) trees were profuse, our tracker Samel Appu, a tall half-Veddah from Hembarawa village, suggested we walk into the jungle to collect the fallen fruit. It was past 8 p.m., but visibility was good, due to the bright moon. Having filled up several gunny bags with the ripe fruit, we were about to turn back, when we heard something like distant thunder approaching rapidly. Samel Appu listened carefully, and then shouted for us to run, saying that a herd of stampeding wild buffaloes was approaching. Dropping everything, we ran helter skelter into the trees. Finally, the herd passed by, but by then we were all lost. It took some time and a lot of “hoo... hoooing” to locate everyone.

On another occasion and in the same area, we were driving past some of the abandoned special lease farms, when we spotted some guava trees growing wild on a hillock. Our old friend Samel Appu suggested we should pluck some guavas. Arriving on top of the hillock, we saw a fantastic sight in the valley below. Around 50 elephants were feeding in the tall grass.

I suggested taking a few photos, and leaving the others Samel and I walked down through the tall grass. Finally, we crept on all fours up to a large anthill. At Samel Appu's signal I raised myself, and saw with much alarm that we were right within the herd. It was the most frightening experience of my life, since there were elephants all round us. Samel, smiling confidently like a schoolboy, whispered not to get scared. Asking me to stay out behind the anthill, he walked right into the herd with gun shouldered and axe in hand like a true Veddah. After half an hour, he stood up and quietly clapped his hands. Up went all the trunks and in a trice, trumpeting madly and with tails up, the herd crashed into the forest, some of them passing us within a few feet, while I crouched behind the anthill in mortal fear. When the dust cleared, silence reigned and I walked back in a daze.

Samel Appu was a fearless man, a poacher and a wily hunter, who knew the jungles well. He knew the ways of animals, and just by looking at the tracks or smelling the air could say which animal had passed, and where it went, and what it was doing. We always felt safe with him around. I have not met him for a long time, and most probably he has passed on to happy hunting grounds.

Hembarawa is a tiny hamlet, an ancient village, north of Alutharama by the Mahaweli. Once I met a villager there, who had miraculously escaped from the jaws of a man-eating crocodile. These estuarine crocodiles, unlike their cousins (marsh crocodiles) are huge, growing up to about 20-feet in length. The man had just finished his bath in the river, along with his little daughter and leaving the child ashore, he waded in to wash some clothes. As he bent over, the man-eater reared up through the water, grabbed him by his head and dragged him in.

Fortunately for the man, the croc had a few broken teeth where it held him, which prevented any serious injury, and allowed him to breathe the foul air in the croc's mouth. In a panic, he kicked and scratched the beast as hard as he could, until all his fingers and toe nails came out and this, coupled with the commotion caused by the other bathers in the vicinity, made the animal release the poor man who was then brought ashore unconscious.

When I met him, he had spent three months at the Mahiyangana hospital, and he showed me the newly grown nails and the scars on his head and neck; clear proof of his incredible ordeal. The croc had been shot later, but not until it had taken a few more hapless victims. It had been just over 16-feet long monster.

My first experience with a real man-killing ‘rogue’ elephant occurred in the area some years later. The jungles around Hembarawa and Serapitiya were being torn down, and the Mahaweli scheme had just commenced. It was pathetic to see hundreds of forest giants, which had held themselves up proudly for centuries, fallen with their massive roots in the air, in the last throes of death under a sweltering sun. The large herds had been pushed back into the remnants of remaining forest from where they raided the newly planted chenas at night.

One full moon night after dinner, we decided to drive into this area as a herd of elephants had been reported to be seen there. We drove along a wide bulldozed road. Some distance away, we spied a fire in a chena by the roadside, and the jeep headlights picked up a large bull elephant standing across the road, and facing the chena hut. A young man was screaming at the elephant and throwing bundles of burning straw at the beast. During a brief intermission when the animal retreated, we drove up and the man ran up, pleading that his wife and newly born child be taken to safety. Before anything could be done, the animal came charging back along the road, and while we frantically reversed, the man desperately ran back to his hut.

As the drama went on, we could hear the cries of the baby. The man's sick father-in-law was the only other occupant of the hut. As the elephant tried to attack the hut over and over again, we would rev the engine and toot the horn, distracting the beast. Meanwhile, the stock of straw and firewood at the hut was running out. Fortunately, after about half an hour, the elephant decided to give up, and slowly retreated down the road and into the forest. It was now just past midnight and having reassured the man, we went back.
Early next morning, we went back. The whole chena had been devastated, and the footprints showed that the animal had come right up to the back door. We advised the man to send his family away and informed the authorities. It was a miraculous escape for the poor man and his family. I later discovered from the school principal of the area that this particular animal had already killed 13 people.

A few months later, the region had been cleared, and today, busy townships such as Girandurukotte and Dehiattakandiya have taken over those once primeval forests where we used to roam. Thousands of homesteads, farms and paddy fields stand upon the old game trails that wound down from the forests and villus to the Mahaweli. Most animals were destroyed and the few that escaped, managed to get across the river, to the safety of Wasgamuwa.
On those white sands of the Ulhitiya, one may yet spot the lonely tracks of an animal that had strayed across, maybe for a nostalgic peek into its old hunting grounds, which we too shared with them a few decades ago.

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