352 BIG GAME SHOOTING 



him till he had gone another mile and a quarter, and only then 

 caught the buck when he dislocated his wounded hock. 



In 1876 the same sportsman had another brilliant gallop on 

 the same horse after a buck wounded in the fleshy part of the 

 thigh. A brace of dogs were slipped, but got away on to other 

 deer early in the run, and the buck was ridden till he dropped 

 and was despatched with a knife. This run was measured 

 about five miles on the map from point to point, and must 

 have been seven or eight miles as the buck went. Cases have 

 been reported of unwounded black buck being run down by 

 dogs in the Bombay Presidency, but in Northern India, though 

 the writer knows of two instances of unwounded does being 

 successfully coursed (one of these at all events was not in young, 

 as it was examined by a medical officer to decide a bet), the 

 bucks could always gallop away from the dogs. 



The biggest bag of black buck the writer knows of was 

 sixty-four bucks in 1883, by two guns in five days and a half. 

 Of these, ten bucks, whose horns were all over 22 in. in 

 length, were shot by one of the sportsmen in a morning's work, 

 The biggest mixed bag by one gun in a day was two nylghai, 

 five ravine deer, and three black buck in 1875. 



Black buck in their wild state are very pugnacious, and 

 when two bucks are fighting they may often be approached 

 without difficulty. I once walked up to within eighty yards of 

 two who were desperately hard at it ; sat down and watched the 

 fight till they stood with their horns locked, and then shot the 

 blacker buck of the pair through the lungs. He threw up his 

 head and bolted, pursued by his antagonist, a brown buck with 

 good horns, who seemed to have had rather the best of the 

 battle while it lasted. They ran about one hundred yards, the 

 brown buck driving and horning the other till the latter 

 dropped dead ; then, after making two or three attacks on the 

 prostrate body, the brown buck began to swagger round it, 

 head and tail in the air, as proud as could be. By this time I 

 had again got well within range, and as the brown buck now 

 apparently saw me for the first time (not having taking any 



