NOTE OF ALARM OF A GAUR 377 



The sharp, short spurts of air which escaped from his 

 nostrils at intervals when he raised his head from side to side 

 or up and down in his endeavours to make out what we were, 

 warned me that I must fire without an instant's delay. 



The distance was quite 70 yards, and the shot, consider- 

 ing the position the animal was then standing in facing 

 me, head and cheek only exposed, was not an easy one. I 

 hesitated for a second or two with the rifle at the present, to 

 consider whether I should not attempt to outflank him and 

 get in a shoulder-shot. 



He might, on the other hand, have not seen us, and have 

 only been suspicious ; or perhaps obtained a very slight slant 

 of our wind, or heard us talking ; in which case, should he 

 catch sight of me crawling along to outflank him, there 

 being little or no cover to screen me, all doubt would then 

 be thrown to the winds, and he would either immediately 

 charge me or dash off, and I should in the latter case have 

 lost the opportunity first offered me of a shot. So quietly 

 making up my mind to fire, I squatted on the ground, and 

 taking a steady aim, fired. On the smoke clearing, I saw the 

 gaur making off at a great pace up a steep incline on the 

 other side of the stream which flowed close by, and over 

 which, a leap cf some 13 feet, the gaur had jumped. 

 Several bamboo stumps which intervened did not permit of 

 my getting in a second shot. I noticed, when aiming at the 

 gaur, that two or three bamboo stems were in my line of fire, 

 and one of them I now saw had been neatly perforated in the 

 centre. 



I became convinced, on sending a Burman to stand at the 

 spot where the gaur had stood when I fired, comparing the 

 height of the bullet-hole from the ground, that the gaur had 

 been hit. 



After partaking of a hurried meal on the banks of the 

 stream we took on the tracks of the gaur, which plainly 

 indicated, after we had gone about 200 or 300 yards, 

 from an occasional splash or two of blood, that the animal 

 was hit and was bleeding freely. The latter is not, as a 

 rule, a good sign ; and if hit fatally behind the shoulder, in- 

 ternal bleeding invariably takes place ; and I noticed during 



