6 THE HUNTING GROUNDS 



awkward attempts to convey the food to my mouth 

 with my fingers, a feat which I was not then ac- 

 customed to perform, although it is the ordinary 

 mode of eating among all classes and castes in India, 

 I had my turn when he came to visit us afterwards, 

 and attempted to eat with a knife and fork for the 

 first time. 



After we had dined, sherbet and sweetmeats were 

 handed round, with hubble-bubbles and hookahs 

 (water-pipes,) and the Killadar informed us that 

 his shekarries * had not returned from the jungles, 

 whither he had sent them to try and find out the 

 whereabouts of a large tiger, who had been commit- 

 ting a good deal of depredation among the herds in 

 the low country ; but that if we would like a day's 

 samburf shooting, he would accompany us on the 

 morrow, and show us a place where we should be 

 nearly certain to find. 



Of course we were agreeable, and after expending 

 a good deal of breath in interchanging compliments, 

 &c., we took our leave and returned to our tents, the 

 Killadar having promised to be with us before day- 

 break with masaltjies or torch-bearers, as it was 

 some short distance to the jungle where we were to 

 hunt, and early dawn was the best time to catch the 

 deer feeding. 



I had never killed a deer, or, indeed, any other 



large game (except a hyena, that ventured into my 



compound, or garden, one night, after my dogs, and 



* Shekarries, hunters. t Sambur, elk (Rusa Aristoteles.) 



