308 BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 



under any exertion." In this I think he is mistaken. This oily 

 sweat is natural and not the result of exertion. I remember shooting 

 an old bull at 8 a.m. that jumped up close to my horse ; it did not 

 go 100 yards, its skin glistened with this oily exudation ; and I 

 have killed others though after the day had got hot, that had under- 

 gone no exertion, in a similar state. If you pass your hand along 

 the hide of a younger brown bull it will become quite greasy, 

 though you cannot see the moisture as you can on an old hairless bull. 

 Shortly after death if the bison has been drinking recently the 

 water runs out of his mouth and forms a nasty puddle. He is 

 geuerally infested with large ticks on the inside of the thighs, 

 so it is as well not to sit triumphant on his carcase. His tail 

 makes excellent soup ; the tongue is very good flesh, and 

 would probably be better salted. The flesh of an old bull 

 is to my mind tough and tasteless ; the marrow is too large and rich. 

 The gall bladder will sometimes be taken by your men. On my 

 asking what the use of it was, they informed me that the contents 

 rubbed on the noses of young dogs made the dogs very keen of 

 scent in hunting deer and pig. In most places your men will not eat 

 the flesh of the bison. Where they do they cut the meat into long 

 strips and dry the flesh in the sun ; the hides are sometimes taken by 

 them and utilized as a covering to the roof of their huts. The 

 bison in uttering its snort of alarm expells the air with great force 

 from his nostrils, and according to Dr. Francis Day, in his account 

 of Cochin, the natives there assert that it will root up a stone from 

 the ground and discharge it with a snort with fatal effect at his 

 adversary — an idea which, though of course fanciful, might readily 

 occur to one. Bison are often blundered on as one stalks through the 

 jungle, and ahead procured with little or no trouble. You do not look 

 with so much satisfaction on such a head as you do on one that you 

 have tracked for many miles. Bison will on such occasions stand and 

 stare at your horse, i*egardless of the men accompanying you, giving 

 you time to dismount and shoot them. On two occasions I rode almost 

 on to bulls before they rose from their lair in the grass. They stood 

 staring at the horse only a few yards off, and made threatening de- 

 monstrations with their horns, but did not charge. Some of the solitary 

 bulls have no doubt been expelled from the herds after a tough fight : 

 one I killed was covered with a number of wounds quite fresh, inflicted 

 by the horns of a rival, but I think most of them lead solitary lives from 

 choice. They appear to be too big and powerful to have been licked by 



