BISON. 149 



had been here for some days, reported that the jungles 

 were a good deal disturbed by grazing cattle, and that 

 there were but few herds of bison in the vicinity, still 

 he had had some sport with bears and other j an wars, 

 including a rogue tusker, which he had fired at and 

 wounded, and which then chased him for a considerable 

 time, nearly catching him on several occasions, but a 

 heavy 8 -bore double-barrel eventually gave the elephant 

 a quietus. I am writing from memory, but believe that 

 the encounter lasted for an hour. The tusks were nice 

 ones, but rather splintered by bullets during the heat of 

 the engagements. 



This gentleman very kindly agreed to an arrangement 

 by which the road from Tippicado to Goondulpett was to 

 be the march between our respective forests, his tract to 

 lie to the west towards the Muddoor jungles, and mine 

 eastwards towards the Billiga Eungums. Very little 

 rain had fallen, and most of the natives were suffering 

 from fever; moreover, there was but little growth of grass 

 to tempt the bison from the heavy forests lying towards 

 the Hona Matti Hills on the east, and Karkankottah to 

 the west. With much difficulty I secured a Sholigar as 

 shikari. He was just released from prison and was 

 anxious for a job, and, as he knew the jungles and there 

 was nobody else available except my hill shikari, who was 

 quite unacquainted with these parts, I took him into my 

 service for the trip. Starting next morning at ten o'clock 

 we walked in a southerly direction for two hours, passing 

 fairly fresh tracks of elephant, tiger, bison, bear, and deer, 

 but none were recent enough to follow. None of the 

 forest trees of the Annamullays were to be seen here, 

 and, although it was virgin forest, the trees were stunted 

 as a rule, looking as if the soil or climate was unsuitable 



