GAME IN SWAMPS. 171 



the approach of darkness to feed and go to water 

 and storms are mostly confined to the period of the 

 rains, when malaria is prevalent in severe type. 



In the next place, as regards the best hunting ground, 

 the young sportsman will not fail to remember that 

 throughout all great forests, there are always to be 

 found swamps where, on account of the nature of the 

 ground, heavy timber will not grow, or has fallen. 

 These places are generally filled with an almost 

 impassable thicket of shrubs and brushwood, and are 

 therefore usually selected by deer, and other sorts of 

 woodland game, as their harbouring places during the 

 daytime. 



There are also sure to exist some more or less 

 extensive areas of ground, where masses of timber 

 have been blown down during hurricanes. These 

 places often present a most extraordinary scene of 

 confusion; the trees lying across each other piled up 

 to a considerable height while among the fallen 

 timber a young growth of trees springs up, forming 

 a tangled mass of dead and living vegetation, through 

 which it is next to impossible to pass. 



Naturally such places are selected by game as their 

 securest sheltering place, and either there, or else in 

 the swamps, the greater portion of the forest creatures 

 are hidden, out of the reach of enemies. It would of 

 course be useless to attempt to follow game into these 

 thickets. 



The hunter should however creep noiselessly to 

 leeward of these places, and take his stand in some 

 well-selected position, where there is a comparatively 

 open space or where several well-beaten game paths 

 pass, having previously arranged for someone with a 



