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CHAPTER VII. 



BLACK-BUCK SHOOTING. 



Black-Buck Shooting Spearing Wounded Antelopes An Unsuc- 

 cessful Gallop A Plucky Buck Stalking, and Other Methods 

 of Pursuit Ground Antelope are Found on Snaring My 

 First Black Buck Empty Pockets A Novel Coup-de-Grdce 

 Circumventing a Wary Herd Strategy A Long Shot at Dusk 

 Curious Effect of a Bullet Chikara, or Ravine-Deer Their 

 Habitat and Horns Concluding Remarks. 



WITHIN a ride of most Indian stations, the Indian 

 antelope (antelope bezoartica) is found in more or 

 less abundance, and affords capital sport both 

 with rifle and spear ; in fact, they may sometimes 

 be bowled over with a charge of shot, and I have 

 frequently bagged them in this manner when 

 beating sugar-cane fields for black partridges and 

 hares in the vicinity of Delhi.* 



* This graceful antelope is too well known to need a detailed 

 description, beyond mentioning that the female differs from the 

 buck in being of a fawn colour, and hornless. The horns varying in 

 length from nineteen to twenty-six inches, and the largest are ob- 



