184 DIARY OF A SPORTSMAN NATURALIST 



unpleasant in a howdah and makes it difficult to shoot from. 

 Not that there was any chance of a shot on the present 

 occasion. The sounder must have been a big one for we 

 appeared to have pigs all round us, and from the deep notes 

 of the irascible grunts of some of the animals there were 

 several old boars in the party. The havildah in the back 

 seat of the howdah was in a state of tense excitement. He 

 wanted meat and was straining his eyes into the depths in 

 the hopes of seeing something which he could point out as a 

 fair mark. I doubt whether even his sharp eyes saw any- 

 thing in the thick tangle below. The attitude of both 

 mahout and elephant was one of intense disgust at being so 

 near the unclean beast. After this interlude we shortly 

 again got into the forest and proceeded through it for a 

 couple of miles without incident save that we passed a 

 small herd of chital. There were three stags in the herd, one 

 with a fair head, but of course all the horns were in velvet. 



The deer were standing in a little glade almost free of under- 

 growth and as the elephant forged slowly ahead they 

 watched him curiously, apparently taking the howdah as 

 part of the animal itself. We advanced slowly almost on to 

 them, our path keeping slightly to the right. When almost 

 abreast the does started edging away, but quite slowly. 

 Beautiful animals, with their light fawn colouring with the 

 lines of white spots running down the ground colour: Very 

 small they looked from my elevation, but eminently 

 graceful. 



We soon afterwards left the forest and advanced over a 

 broad stony nullah bed interrupted by two or three islands 

 covered with shisham and khair trees and patches of tall 

 grass. On one of these islands I recognized the tree in which 

 I had sat up for a tiger on several occasions in the hot 

 weather two years back, my second in the Dun, on which 

 occasion I made a tour round the whole of it, both western 

 and eastern, and had a most enjoyable seven weeks which 



