88 fiOtfBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 



September and October, after wliicli the fish must be looked for in 

 the bigger waters in the plains below. I Would advice you to take 

 a rifle, though it is quite possible you may find little' or no use for 

 it. It depends, of course, a good deal on the direction in which 

 yon go, and how far. If you are simply rambling round about 

 Simla, which is all that I am now supposing you to intend to do, 

 and nearly all that I can myself pretend to have done, you may not 

 possibly see a four-footed creature bigger than a jackal or a fox. 

 By the way, a Simla fox (Vutpes mototarms) in autumn (and even 

 more so in winter, I believe) is a beautiful creature. It has, as you 

 see here, a lovely coat and a noble brush : it makes a very handsome 

 tug when properly mounted. There are, however, bears there, and 

 in some places a good many. I have heard of as many as five being 

 shot in one day close to the road. I mean the Himalayan black 

 bear (Ursus tibetanus) ; the brown bear of Cashmere (Ursus 

 isahellinus) is very rarely, if ever now, met within this neighbour- 

 hood, though I believe there was a time not so very long ago when 

 it was not so scarce. The Barra-singh of Cashmere {Cervus cash- 

 Trtirianus) too is another animal which used occasionally to be seen 

 in this district, but has been crowded out by the multiplication 

 of guns. Goral, however (Nemorhcpdus gorai), a small species of 

 mountain goat you will find in some places, and those not far from 

 Simla, pretty plentifully, I believe. I have heard local sportsmen 

 speak disparagingly of goral shooting a3 very tame work, and, to 

 judge by some accounts of it I have heard, it must often be so. My 

 own experience was as small as it well could be, but the one I 

 saw and shot, on the only occasion I ever went after goral, gave me 

 as pretty an afternoon's walking and climbing on a steep hillside 

 among oaks and ferns aud rhododendrons and grand grey crao-s as 

 one could well wish to have. If your larder is low, you will 

 not despise goral ; a laddie of goral is by no means to be 

 contemned, even if you do not strictly follow the advice a serjeant 

 pensioner gave me, to be " sure and hang it three weeks, Sorr." 

 Tahr and burrehl and even ibex you may meet if you go far 

 enough ; but I will not say how far that may be. I never saw any 

 of them though I have come across pugs (on a retired part of 

 Hattoo, I think), which doubtless belonged to one or other of them. 

 I could not make out from my shikaree to which. It is not your 

 rifle then you must depend upon for your sport, but your gun. For 

 this you may always find some occupation pretty well anywhere in 



