A NIGHT BY A JUNGLE POOL 163 



are favoured by peculiar geological conditions for the re- 

 tention of water. 



All that now remains of the verdure of the rainy season 

 is the mass of dead scorched creepers, festooning the bare 

 trunks and leafless branches of forest trees, only a few 

 of which throw out a thick head of sappy young leaves at 

 this period. 



The general appearance of these jungles is that of 

 English woods in October thin on the steep exposed 

 slopes of now parched and beaten-down spear-grass, dense 

 and thicketty in the ravines seaming their sides. 



Along the dry boulder-strewn bed of the stream rises 

 a fringe of larger, taller trees, opening into little occasional 

 bays or natural clearings ; and the entire forest is carpeted, 

 often knee-deep, with the great dried and fallen leaves 

 of the teak and other trees. In such ground not a step 

 may be taken in silence. On the other hand, game which 

 might otherwise have escaped notice betrays itself here by 

 its movement through the loud-crackling leaves. 



In those parts game is scarce and wary ; and to anyone 

 who would condemn me as a poacher I would recommend 

 a few days in the dense and hard-to-work jungles of which 

 I speak. If you cannot come to your game, why not let it 

 come to you, which is, after all, the raison d'etre of beating 

 or driving. Besides this, there is a certain great charm in 

 a night vigil, such as I hope to describe, understood that 

 you don't smoke heavily or open sodas with a noisy 

 gurgling every half-hour, and then go to sleep condemning 

 it all as a fraud. 



We had taken the precaution of "stopping" this pool 

 for the past two nights, by the simple expedient of a couple 

 of jungle men and a smouldering cowdung fire placed 

 a hundred yards or so up the glen. My Korkus reported 

 that on the second night they had spent most of their time 

 in a tree, as a tiger had shown extreme impatience at being 

 baulked of his water, and had prowled round and round 



