128 DIARY OF A SPORTSMAN NATURALIST 



tuaries be more feasible or prove of such high /alue both 

 in the interests of the maintenance of the fauna and of its 

 study. 



The opening of the country has been largely responsible for 

 the restriction of the animals' haunts in Bengal and Assam. 

 For instance the Western Duars no longer contain sufficiently 

 extensive jungles to harbour rhinoceros and buffalo. To the 

 apathy displayed in the past by the authorities in this region 

 is attributable the deterioration of the stock almost to the 

 verge of extinction. The forests are in large blocks, and it 

 would have been sufficient to enforce the existing rules 

 under the Forest Act. Neglect on this score has now 

 reduced the numbers of such animals as rhinoceros, buffalo 

 and bison to such small figures that deterioration if not 

 extinction must follow. This point, i.e. the neglect to 

 enforce existing rules and regulations, applies, or applied 

 till recently, generally throughout India. 



In Assam sanctuaries have been in existence for some 

 years in Goalpara and elsewhere, and these are closed to all 

 shooting. In Jalpaiguri and the Buxa Duars no rhinoceros, 

 buffalo or bison may be shot at all, as the forests are 

 nominally sanctuaries for these anirnals, but the blocks of 

 forest are too small to contain animals of such wandering 

 propensities. Access to the Bhutan Hills during the hot 

 weather is also now cut off, owing to the settlements of 

 Nepalis on the outer hills. The animals thus have a much 

 restricted habitat, and cannot get away into the outer 

 hills as formerly during the fly season in the hot weather. 



Fortunately Burma was disarmed comparatively recently, 

 and the Government has not granted gun licences in anything 

 like the same numbers as elsewhere. In many places game 

 is believed to have increased, but the European sportsman 

 has been at work there and the fine herds of brow-antlered 

 deer or Thamin {Cervus Eldi) were almost exterminated 

 before measures of protection were introduced. Deteriora- 

 tion must of necessity follow even if the race does not 

 become exterminated. 



During a delightful two years' sojourn in charge of the 

 Tista Division with headquarters in the beautiful little 

 hill station of Kalimpong, four thousand feet up in the 

 Himalaya (British Sikkim), and some twenty-five miles to 

 the east of Darjiling, I was able to make some acquaintance 

 with the plains fauna of the Bengal Duars, the western 



