BY TAMARIND AND MHOWA 173 



remains to be seen, and appears doubtful; but in days 

 not so very long ago they formed a kind of sportsman's 

 paradise. 



Composed for the most part of waist-high lemon-grass, 

 studded with copsewood, amid which here and there rises 

 the handsome, oak-like, sweet-flowering mhowa, these re- 

 serves are usually traversed by a sandy ndla, in which will 

 be found one or two perennial pools. These winding water- 

 courses are fringed by a strip of the larger woodland trees, 

 such as the mango, kowa, banyan, anjan, etc., and the 

 ground is, for the greater part, a dead flat, rendering it 

 no difficult matter for one unacquainted with its few natural 

 features to lose his way, although not seriously, yet in a 

 manner sufficiently exhausting under an Indian summer 

 sun. 



Fairly level ground, shade, water, the proximity of 

 some cultivation, and the usually undisturbed quiet of their 

 solitude, render these small forest blocks quite exceptionally 

 suited to the requirements of the graceful chftal, and of 

 truly wondrous numbers of hog, which, in their turn, serve 

 to attract the felines that prey on them. As a rule, at least 

 a couple of tigers and a family or two of panthers were 

 to be found in each of those bandis. 



The writer will long remember the first early morning 

 stroll he took in one of those delightful bits of woodland. 

 We were engaged in visiting a distant corner of the forest, 

 where two of our tiger-baits had been tied out the previous 

 evening, and after a cup of coffee had left camp, on foot, 

 at the earliest flush of the " false dawn." That it is hot in 

 those parts during April and May cannot be denied, and 

 the fierce midday hours sadly sap the strength of the 

 exotic exile ; but, at this early dawn, newly-aroused nature 

 enjoys the coolest of all the twenty-four hours, and a light 

 dew has fallen, giving a fresh appearance to the parched 

 surroundings. 



The Indian hot-weather season has a somewhat similar 



