THE BIRDS AT THE TANK. 159 



you find a weapon that fits your figure, then experiment 

 with it before a looking-glass, or fire at a target, and if the 

 result is not satisfactory, send it back to your gunmaker, 

 and have the stock made shorter or longer, straighter or 

 more crooked, until the fit is perfect. There have been 

 also plenty of directions (mostly contradicting each other) 

 about the using of the guri : how to hold it, how to aim, 

 how many of your eyes to shut when you fire, &c. We go 

 about things in a different way in India, at least we have 

 done so since the pagoda-tree withered away. Instead of 

 repairing to "our gunmaker," we mount our nag and find 



our way to where the broad signboard of jee jee, 



Europe Shopkeeper, Auctioneer, and Commission Agent, 

 spreads itself before a dilapidated museum of secondhand 

 tongas, perambulators, tents, and tatoos, and there we con- 

 tend with the bland Mr. jee for the gun which Lieu- 

 tenant Smith, ordered off to Kandahar, has left to be sold 

 for whatever it will fetch. Bearing our prize home, I do not 

 say that we consult our chum as to whether the powder 

 or the shot should be put in first, but we pick up know- 

 ledge where we can find it, and the griffin, who perhaps 

 never handled a gun until he came to India, may in a 

 wonderfully short time have developed into a keen shik- 



