150 AN AWKWARD PLIGHT. 



apt to lay hold with its trunk of anything within reach, 

 without respect even to persons, to place under its feet for 

 support. And the usual method adopted, when everything 

 else fails, for extricating an elephant from a " fussnml " 

 (swamp or quicksand), is to throw branches of trees, bundles 

 of grass, &c., within its reach. These the sagacious beast 

 forces down with its trunk under its feet, until the footing 

 thus made becomes tolerably firm. 



At length, by dint of great perseverance and exertion on 

 the part of Golab Soondrie, she reached the edge of this 

 abominable quagmire, and having managed to get her fore- 

 feet up on to some firmer-looking ground, was with difficulty 

 dragging out her hind-quarters, when to my consternation 

 the rotten bank gave way under her weight. Back she slid 

 into the horrible slough almost perpendicularly so much so 

 that the guns lying in their sloping positions alongside me 

 in the howdah fell back on to iny outstretched arms, as I 

 clutched the side-rails for support, and I for the moment 

 feared she was going to roll completely over. Matters now 

 looked serious ; for the " kawas " (back partition) of the 

 howdah was quite under water, and the black muddy fluid 

 reached half-way up to my knees in the fore-part of it. 

 The mahout was obliged to quit his seat on the neck of the 

 elephant, and little else was to be seen of the animal save 

 the top of her head and her trunk. Still the fine old crea- 

 ture continued to make the most prodigious efforts, until at 

 last, thanks to her being a small and an active elephant, she 

 managed to scramble out. Before we overtook the rest of 

 the party who, from the thickness of the jungle, had not 

 seen our mishap they had almost reached the tents, which 

 were near at hand, when the dirty plight we presented after 

 our mud-larking adventure afforded much merriment at our 

 expense. 



Finding there was no fresh " kubber " (intelligence) of 

 tigers in this vicinity, we next day had a beat for game in 

 general, of which the pads showed a fair amount, when, to- 



