BLACK-BUCK SHOOTING. 109 



shallow pond into which he rushed, and stood at 

 bay. I rode in after him, the water reaching 

 nearly to my girths, and on getting within some 

 three or four yards of him down went his head, 

 and he came at me most viciously. Luckily for 

 me, however, as he got his long spiral horns 

 almost under my horse's belly, his feet stuck in 

 some bit of extra tenacious mud, and caused him 

 to halt for a moment, and I seized the opportunity 

 to spear him, and then, jumping off quickly, 

 seized him by the horns and plunged my shikar 

 knife into his throat. 



It must have been a curious scene to any on- 

 looker : the wounded buck and myself, struggling 

 and floundering about in the muddy water, and 

 my horse calmly quenching his thirst close by, 

 whilst the setting sun in the background was 

 sinking to rest in a flood of rosy light ! 



The stalking of antelope on the arid and burn- 

 ing plains of India is to my mind a greater test 

 of a sportsman's capabilities in the art of l venerie ' 

 than stalking the noble red-deer among the 

 heathery braes and rocky corries of bonnie Scot- 

 land. In the latter you have the advantage of 

 numerous inequalities of ground, besides another 

 very important assistance in the shape of a less 

 delusive atmosphere, for in tj^e quivering haze 

 caused by the fierce rays of the Indian sun re- 



