128 THE HIGHLANDS OF CENTRAL INDIA. 



remains. Thus hill after hill, and ravine after ravine, are put 

 between one and home in the excitement of the chase, till 

 suddenly you pull up and realize what an immense distance 

 you have come, and that you cannot possibly get back before 

 the middle of the night. If you have anything to eat, the best 

 course under such circumstances is to sleep where you are. 

 I often used to bivouac thus when out after bison ; and seldom 

 found it much of a hardship. A good fire can always be lit in 

 a few minutes, dry wood being never far off in an Indian jungle. 

 An elevated place, at the same time sheltered from the wind, 

 should be chosen for the purpose, as the valleys are more 

 malarious at night. A shelter of boughs should always be 

 knocked up, which your wild men will do handsomely in five 

 minutes. I learned more of the simple nature of the forest 

 people during the few hours' chat by the fire on these occa- 

 sions than I believe I would have done otherwise in as many 

 years. I think they got attached to me a good deal ; and, 

 though they are not very demonstrative at any time, Iwas 

 often touched by some simple act of thoughtfulness one would 

 hardly have expected from their untutored natures. 



About the hardest day I had was after a couple of bulls I 

 had seen grazing on the very top of Dhupgarh, looming against 

 the sky-line like two young elephants in the red sunlight. It 

 was evening when I found them, and, as the spot was 

 inaccessible by stalking, I sent round a couple of Korkiis to 

 move them, while I posted myself on the road they would be 

 most likely to take down the hill. They went, however, by a 

 pass a few hundred yards further on ; and though I ran over 

 the intervening bare and slippery rocks as hard as I could to 

 get a shot, I was only in time to see them floundering down 

 the hill-side like two great rocks, and they never pulled up 

 till far down in the blue haze that huncr over the bottom of 



