HUNTING IN THE INDIES 219 



Four days later came " the run of the season." 

 After several blank draws I put hounds into a large 

 cotton-field, and almost before they spoke to him a 

 jackal went away at the far side. Hounds came to 

 my horn and went away at a great pace, so much so 

 that I had to push my Arab along to live with them. 

 The slower hounds tailed shamefully, but there was 

 nobody to see. At the end of eleven minutes they 

 checked, but I was fortunate enough to hit it off at 

 once by casting on. They soon settled down again, 

 and the pace, though not so very great, remained 

 fast. At last they checked again, having now been 

 running three-quarters of an hour. As it was just 

 on dark, and my native whip was nowhere to be 

 seen, I stopped them. The distance, measured be- 

 tween the two villages, close to which the find and 

 last check respectively took place, was exactly jBve 

 miles in a straight line ; but of course hounds ran a 

 good deal more. I may add that some weeks later 

 I found in the same covert. The jack broke in 

 exactly the same place, heading in the same direc- 

 tion. Although the atmospheric conditions were 

 exactly similar, hounds, who got away on good terms 

 with him, literally could not run a yard. 



During November and December sport continued 

 good, but as it is my object to give my readers a 

 general idea of the sport rather than a series of 

 accounts of runs, I will not draw further on my diary. 

 Moreover, some of the runs were described in The 

 Field at the time. At last the day came when the 

 regiment had to commence its long march to the 

 other side of India. I had arranged for the con- 

 tinuance of the Hunt in the country, but my 

 favourites were to follow the horn of another. It 



