3o8 HAUNTS AND HOBBIES 



there were no elephants in those forests. Colonel 

 Briggs' translation was published about seventy years 

 ago, and must have been composed, we may presume, 

 a little earlier. It would appear, therefore, that the 

 elephants had disappeared within a period not much 

 exceeding two centuries and a half 



But the forests still exist ; at least, in my time 

 they did, for I have passed through them : and they 

 have always remained, as indeed have most of the 

 other parts of the great forest belt, under the native 

 rule. 



I will now speak of the lion. As compared with the 

 tigers, the leopards, and some other of the larger beasts 

 of prey, the lions have at no time been very abundant 

 in India. The area of their range has also been more 

 restricted. They have never, for example, been found, 

 I believe, to the eastward of the Jumna. In the tracts 

 of country that border that river on the west the lions 

 were, however, in former times tolerably numerous ; 

 they were sufficiently numerous to render the hunt- 

 ing them one of the ordinary sports. There are several 

 descriptions of lion hunts and allusions to the sport 

 in the Ayeen Akbari and also in the memoirs of the 

 Emperor Jehangire. Some of them I will quote ; they 

 may perhaps be found entertaining. 



The Ayeen Akbari describes one mode of hunting 

 the lion which it states was occasionally practised, and 

 which must certainly have been most hazardous. It 

 was as follows. A man mounted on a buffalo rode up 

 to the lion, and then urged on the buffalo to attack it. 

 A fierce combat of course ensued. In the end the 



