138 BEASTS OF PREY AT WATER HOLES. 



they are known to resort, but this description of sport 

 will be best considered in our next chapter on hunting 

 in the plains, where the subject of night-shooting will 

 be duly gone into. 



Where a state of things such as has been here described 

 exists, the habits of the game will generally be found 

 pretty well entirely nocturnal ; and it will be but 

 seldom that any of the heavier and wilder animals 

 will be visible after the day has broken. Such districts 

 are also generally infested by numerous beasts of prey, 

 according to locality; such for instance as the tiger 

 and the panther in India; or the lion, the leopard, etc., 

 in Africa ; but in most countries it is almost hopeless 

 to attempt to get shots at this latter class of animals 

 by daylight, unless they are hunted for, and driven out 

 of cover by elephants or a small army of beaters, as 

 has been the practice from time immemorial in Bengal 

 and other parts of India : because the habits of the 

 larger beasts of prey are strictly nocturnal : they 

 mostly lie in wait for their prey at drinking places, 

 or on paths which they are known to frequent by 

 night, and when they kill a beast they generally do 

 so in the night; a hearty meal is then made upon the 

 carcase, a visit to the water usually follows, and then 

 they are off again to their lairs. 



It is only in very wild districts, remote from the 

 dwellings of man, where firearms have as yet been 

 seldom used, and where the wild beasts of the field 

 still roam in all their pristine state of savage liberty, 

 that beasts of prey, such as the lion, continue to roam 

 about fearlessly by day; for though their nature may 

 be ever so ferocious where timid and mostly helpless 

 victims are concerned, the personal daring of really 



