346 THE HIGHLANDS OF CENTKAL INDIA. 



ground, from which project two wooden arms, drilled with 

 holes; through these a peeled wand is passed, the top of 

 which is decorated with a streamer of red cloth. Close by is 

 a cairn of stones, to which every passer-by adds another. 

 These altars are generally erected to the manes of some one of 

 their race who bore a saintly reputation during life, and 

 offerings placed on them are supposed to propitiate his spirit. 

 On this occasion the Grond who had dropped behind, and who 

 was the leader and concocter of the present hunt, stopped 

 before the altar ; and, after a prostration, extracted from the 

 folds of his waistcloth, and placed on the plate constructed 

 for such purposes, a peeled onion ! Each of the band then 

 added a stone to the heap, muttering at the same time some- 

 thing I could not make out, and passed on. This was for 

 luck. 



We soon reached our station, and taking up a properly 

 concealed position, awaited the approach of the game. The 

 beaters had a long way to go round, and we had waited about 

 an hour when their voices began to be heard, as they advanced 

 in a long line that stretched completely across the spur. They 

 were still about a quarter of a mile off, when I made out that 

 something unexpected had occurred, by their shouts suddenly 

 ceasing, and then breaking out into a terrific and concentrated 

 yell ! By my glass I saw that some of them had taken to 

 trees, and that all were looking down the hill-side to the left 

 of the line. Advancing my Dollond in that direction, I made 

 out some black objects trundling down the hill, and a few 

 moments afterwards, as they emerged on the plain, I saw that 

 they were a bear and two cubs ; they were making for another 

 spur of the hill that ran parallel to the one we were beating, 

 at a distance of about half a mile. Between them ran the 

 dry bed of a nala, formed of a natural pavement of huge flag- 



