UNDER THE JAMUNS 189 



the clearing and the kfitki field, and I hear and know it 

 all!" 



" Then let there be a charpdi here half an hour before 

 sundown," quoth I, "and bark-ropes, too, against my 

 return ; and a suitable reward shall be thine.* 



Towards evening I was riding back to the rendezvous. 



To my left ascended a mountain shoulder, out of which 

 was carved the tortuous little road I followed : to my right 

 there yawned a huge khdra of misty depth. At its bottom 

 lay tiny patches of dark green tall mango groves in the 

 bed of the stream, near the one waterhole that I knew of 

 there. The great Kamdar khdra ! Nineteen hundred feet 

 deep, and a mile across. From its depths came the faint 

 whoops of langurs at play, and the distant calls of grey 

 jungle-cocks. The sun was declining to rest far beyond 

 the stretching lower ranges of the Melghat. The road 

 made some agonising twists, skipped across a narrow, 

 sharp-backed col, with sheer, bare, yellow -grassed couloirs 

 falling precipitously to right and left, and toiled up a long 

 spur to the top of the plateau of Bairat, where grew my 

 jdmtin tree. 



My man had preceded me, with rug and food, and the 

 Korku, having fulfilled his promise of the morning, stood 

 there, with a friend to help him fix the machdn. 



There were two large plum trees, about twenty yards 

 apart, and between them grew an aola tree. In the latter 

 I caused the string cot to be tied. While this operation 

 was in progress, I and my orderly tore down large quanti- 

 ties of plums, and disposed them temptingly on an open 

 space at a comfortable angle from my tree, and about five 

 yards from the spot where I should be seated, rifle in hand. 

 At last all was ready, and I mounted to my perch and 

 settled everything in a thoroughly comfortable manner 

 rifle with night-sight at my side, water-bottle hanging 



