CHAPTER XIV. 



"Soncrantie" Meet. 



" Soncrantie " is the native New Year, and corre- 

 sponds to the 12th January. It is a general holiday for 

 all classes, specially so among the lower who will not do 

 any work, and so most of the factories are closed on 

 that day. Being a general holiday we reserved it as a 

 special day for hog-hunting, and many an exciting and 

 pleasant day we had on " Soncrantie." To the porcine 

 tribe it must have been a red-letter day, as close upon 

 two hundred boars fell on that day, Sur le Champ de 

 bataille. 



On "Soncrantie" day, 1874, the following found their 

 way to Choa for a day's hog-hunting, viz. — W. Morey, 

 M. Ferguson, R. C. Lyall and Y. Lindsay. 



Lindsay, who was new in the district, had been talk- 

 ing about hog-hunting as being mere child's play, and 

 when he told us he had brought a couple of walers, an 

 Arab and a country-bred, our hope of sharing in the 

 sport fell to zero, and we looked very small, indeed, as 

 most of us could boast only of two nags at the outside ; 

 but this feeling soon vanished when we discovered that 

 most of Lindsay's horses were hors de combat. The two 



