212 DIARY OF A SPORTSMAN NATURALIST 



attained by drinking as little as possible whilst actually 

 tracking in the hot sun, and not more than is absolutely 

 essential on return to camp. Some stimulant is required in 

 a climate like India, but reduce the amount taken to the 

 lowest whilst on shooting expeditions which entail days of 

 hard tracking. And the same applies to smoking. Although 

 a smoker, I personally found that of necessity, and without 

 suffering inconvenience, I gave up smoking all day, confining 

 myself to a smoke after dinner. Of course smoking when on 

 a hot trail is impossible. The risk of the animals scenting 

 it is too great. After considerable experience and trials 

 I found cold weak tea without milk (the milk always turns 

 sour in the heat) or sugar is the best thirst quencher. Do 

 not drink at every stream you reach whilst on a long track. 

 You become much hotter by so doing as you climb the 

 opposite hill and the perspiration pouring down your face 

 blinds you. If you then run into your bison you run a strong 

 chance of missing him. In addition the constant drinking 

 reduces your powers of endurance and you become flabby 

 and useless by the early afternoon. I admit that it is very 

 hard at first to resist the temptation to drink at every 

 stream. The water of the hill stream is so invitingly 

 sparkling. But by dint of exercising restraint it is astound- 

 ing how soon one finds the temptation diminish until in 

 the end you do not feel an inclination to drink. 



On the subject of the art of tracking itself ! One could 

 write a book on it alone. It is too large a matter to be treated 

 of here. Of one thing one may be positive. The European 

 brought up in civilization can never hope to vie with or 

 emulate the jungle-man who has spent his life in the forests, 

 learning the woodcraft of the forest, and having at his back 

 a long line of ancestors who lived a similar life. Our own 

 ancestors, it is true, lived in similar fashion in the forests 

 of Britain fifteen hundred or so years ago. But the senses 

 of the jungle-man, which those ancestors of ours likewise 

 possessed, have become atrophied in us by centuries of 

 disuse. This is not to say, however, that we cannot, by 

 giving our whole attention to the matter, absorb some of 

 the jungle lore of the jungle-man and learn something of 

 his marvellous tracking powers. Learn to pick out the tracks 

 of the different jungle denizens ; learn to estimate the 

 period of time at which these tracks were made the hours 

 which have elapsed since the animal left them behind him ; 



