DEER. 189 



lower caught him in the neck and rolled him over dead. 

 I paced the distance and found it to be 172 yards. 



In the afternoon I had a long and unsuccessful stalk 

 after another stag in undulating ground, where the wind 

 perpetually shifting betrayed us in the end. The best 

 sambur head I ever got was at the foot of Gopaulswamy 

 Hill, a famous tract for all kinds of game, and which can 

 be worked by camping on, or near the top of, the hill, which 

 is 4500 feet above the level of the sea, thus avoiding the 

 deadly malaria of the lower jungles. My camp was 

 pitched on a coll joining the two highest points of the 

 range, and close to a shrine dedicated to the Hindoo Pan, 

 the shepherd's god, Gopaul. Some Brahmin priests who 

 lived there paid me a visit soon after my arrival, imploring 

 me to prohibit my Madrassee servants who were pariahs 

 from drawing water from an adjacent holy well, and, on 

 being asked how cooking and washing water was to be 

 obtained, replied that if I drew the water myself all would 

 be well, but that the low caste natives would defile it, and 

 draw down the fury of Gopaul on all concerned. Their 

 wishes were of course yielded to. They subsequently in- 

 formed me that a sahib who had encamped there once before, 

 had not restrained his servants, who desecrated the well. 

 His tent was first blown down, and a severe domestic affliction 

 befell him soon afterwards. A friend of mine informed me 

 that these statements were not without foundation. From 

 here one could command the jungles from Muddoor on 

 the west, to Tippicado on the south, which were at one 

 time perhaps the best in Southern India for elephants and 

 bison, but notoriously unhealthy. The pull up the hill at 

 the end of a long day, although very stiff work, was the only 

 way to escape the malaria. 



On one occasion, when following a rogue elephant at 



