34 FOX-HOUND, FOREST, AND PRAIRIE. 



on to the cluster of huts, round which our quarry has often 

 roamed, and where he hopes now to shake off his stubborn 

 pursuers. But quickly he is pushed again into the open, 

 though only to cross a mile of rugged plain, and gain a rocky 

 hill beyond. Some forty minutes of hunting and galloping 

 has brought us here, and all who know the spot declare that 

 jackal was never yet known to break hence, and we must 

 fain be satisfied with the sport already seen. But surely our 

 gallant friend knows well the Prince is out, and now he will 

 show him how an Indian jackal can run, and fight, and die. 

 The hounds have turned him two or three times about the 

 rocks, their speckled bodies glancing brightly among the dull 

 brown boulders, and the hillside re-echoing with their eager 

 voices, when Tally-ho ! the great gaunt loping form bounds 

 stealthily past behind the knot of horsemen ; and, with a dis- 

 dainful grin over his shoulder and a whisk of his meagre brush, 

 our jackal strikes boldly over the open once more. There is no 

 covert nearer than that bushy hill four miles away ; and between 

 it and here lies as fine a stretch of riding ground as is to be 

 found in the Presidency — early paddy fields that have been 

 harvested and dried, and through which run numberless water- 

 courses varying from 1 ft. to 10 ft. in width. It takes a minute 

 or two to get the pack out upon the line, for no one can " put 

 'em round " on this granite hill, while, as for the black whipper- 

 in, he is apparently kept chiefly for ornament, as may be patent 

 when I mention the fact that at the forthcoming Christmas 

 tree, to be given to the school children of Madras, he is likely 

 to figure as a giant merry-thought penwiper, having been 

 fashioned and clothed exactly on the model of these ingenious 

 toys. 



But soon hounds are away again on a fiery scent, running as 

 if they meant business — and blood. A quarter of a mile brings 

 us to a river that owns no bridge and apparently no ford. For 

 the glory of the navy, though, Lord Charles Beresford fathoms 

 its depth, and half swimming, half plunging, gets to the right 

 side without his helmet, for which he has to return and fish. 



