162 KURBEER'S SAD END. 



Before turning to it, however, I have a sorrowful episode to 

 relate respecting my little Goorkha shikaree Kurbeer, who 

 has on one or two occasions figured rather prominently in the 

 preceding pages of this book. He had unfortunately been 

 prevented from accompanying me to Cashmere, and of his sad 

 fate I had heard during my sojourn there. It appeared that 

 when out hunting with a comrade he had accidentally shot 

 him dead. From the evidence of a little lad who was out 

 with them, it was concluded that, either in a fit of remorse or 

 from fear of what he thought might be the consequences to 

 himself, he had committed suicide. His body was never 

 found, only a spaniel I had given him, his empty gun, and 

 his kookerie beside a rapid mountain-torrent, where the little 

 lad said he had left him after the accident, whilst he ran to 

 the nearest village for assistance. It was therefore supposed 

 either that, after having shot himself, his body must have 

 fallen into the torrent which was in flood at the time 

 and been swept away, or that he had deserted. The latter 

 seemed improbable from the fact of his dog having been 

 found, and the little lad having heard the report of a gun 

 at the place he had left Kurbeer beside the corpse of his 

 comrade. There was a sad mystery about the whole affair 

 that was never cleared up. Any way, I had to lament the 

 loss of one of the stanchest and best shikarees that ever ac- 

 companied me on a hillside. 



I was up on the Kajuag range, north of the river Jhelum, 

 below Baramoola, hunting that magnificent wild goat the 

 markhor, when a messenger arrived bearing an order to re- 

 join my regiment. Many military officers who were that 

 year in the valley had thus to hurry away from it before the 

 expiration of their leave, to join a field force proceeding on 

 service against some of the hill tribes on the North- West 

 Frontier. Of a merry circle of seven, five of whom belonged 

 to my own regiment, who dined together one evening on our 

 route to rejoin, poor Trotter of the Artillery a fellow-cadet 



