AN ANIMAL CHARMER. 281 



go out in the wilderness and charm the foxes and wild 

 beasts. Elephants were sent for, and we adjourned to a 

 jungle about two miles from camp, meeting Alan returning 

 from shooting on our way. 



The "jungle," I must add, is another Indian fraud. One 

 pictures palms, bamboos, huge banyan-trees festooned with 

 creepers — in short a dense forest of semi-tropical vegetation. 

 Instead of which one sees (in Northern India at least) at 

 the most a thicket of thorn trees, undergrown with long 

 dried-up grass. Our jungle to-night was an endless uncul- 

 tivated plain, sparsely dotted with stunted shrubs, and from 

 an elephant one could see a considerable distance. 



The conjurer told us to remain quiet, whilst he went 

 forward about a hundred yards, and concealed himself 

 behind a bush. He then began a muffled chuckling kind of 

 call, which he kept up without ceasing. In about two 

 minutes a fox came out of a little nullah close by, and, look- 

 ing suspiciously about him, trotted towards the noise. Then 

 came another, and presently two or three more ran in from 

 different directions. Soon four or five appeared in the dis- 

 tance, followed by several others ; and finally two big 

 jackals, quite half a mile away, came galloping up, as if 

 afraid of being too late for the fun. At last there must 

 have been thirty or forty foxes and jackals clustered together 

 like a pack of hounds not a hundred yards from the bush. 

 They all looked frightened, and seemed to come against their 



