498 WILD SPOJtTS OF BURMA AND ASSAM 



the body of the buffalo, and in that position carried him as 

 easily as a baby, and laid him at the feet of the Rajah ! " 



This story must be accepted cum grano salis, as no ele- 

 phant could possibly lift up and carry a wild bull buffalo as 

 here described ; but the account, apart from self-evident 

 exaggeration, is interesting, as showing the power and state 

 of the Jynteah Rajahs of those days. When I knew them 

 twenty years ago they were as poor as church mice, and I do 

 not think there was an elephant in the possession of one of them. 

 Those they had were requisitioned for the Bhootan war, and 

 died of hard work and insufficient food and worse treatment. 

 Their wealth, as I have before said, consists in orange and 

 betel-nut groves and limestone. Many years ago, a well- 

 known merchant entered into a highly advantageous contract 

 as far as he himself was concerned, and rented for a nominal 

 sum immense tracks of orange and betel-nut trees from a 

 Cossyah- Jynteah Rajah, the terms of his lease being written 

 in their language " for as long as he remained above ground," 

 meaning thereby for as long as he lived ; but by the time he 

 died these plantations were yielding over 5000 net profit 

 per annum. So his knowing wife had a glass coffin made, in 

 which, up to the time I left that part of the world, his remains 

 lay exposed to view in one of the rooms of his bungalow. 

 The Rajah appealed, hoping the Judge would take a sensible 

 view of the lease, but he gave it in favour of the widow ! 



When the plains are inundated the deer find their way up 

 the hills, and tigers and panthers follow them. I have seen 

 the fresh pugs of a tiger in the verandah of the dak bungalow 

 at Cherra Poonghie. Tigers used to find their way up to 

 Shillong, too, and we killed several there on foot, and the 

 Gurkhas accounted for others. Panthers, or rather leopards, 

 were very plentiful ; we shot a good many, more were caught 

 in traps; but it was almost impossible to keep a dog for them, 

 for they preyed on them. 



I made several trips into these hills, sometimes alone, and 

 at others in company ; we generally got bears and sambur. 

 Once I took my family down to Oomseing and beat the 

 neighbouring hills. The grass had not been burnt, so I got 

 together a few Cossyahs and told them to set the hills on fire, 



