42 ROUGHING IT IN SOUTHERN INDIA 



turn his course, would serve to give him pause, so gaining 

 us a little start of him, which was all we could hope for. 

 In a wonderfully short time we had packed up and were 

 off, nothing hindering. 



Our camp at this place consisted of stoutly constructed 

 huts of bamboo and logs, knit together with tough bark 

 and fibre : these were intended to last from year to year, 

 and were wind and weather, though not ' rogue,' proof. 

 The locality had been chosen with an eye to its advantages : 

 water at hand in a mountain spring ; cover for game ; 

 the approach an easy ascent for supply coolies or pack- 

 ponies — this place combined them all, and had been a 

 regular camp for a year or two previously, thus it was 

 particularly convenient. There were two or three huts, 

 as ship-shape and compact as cabins, for ourselves ; a 

 guest-chamber for the chance visitor or friend who might 

 be with us ; a store-room ; servants' and kitchen quarters ; 

 and very strong, panther-proof enclosures for the horses 

 and dogs, the latter having a raised platform, thickly 

 covered with leaves and grass, for their bed ; there was 

 even a flower-garden, through which a rivulet had been 

 turned, and in bloom there at the time were balsams, 

 which I most especially remember — scarlet, mauve, and 

 white. 



A letter was despatched without delay to our Collector 

 with a request for the needed permit, F. meanwhile 

 settling me temporarily at a safe distance away. The 

 following day he returned to the camp — or rather the site of 

 it only, as it proved — for not a thing was left standing ! 

 The sheet and jangling drums had had their effect, but 

 though the latter were all wrenched down the sheet was 

 absolutely untouched ; evidently the ' rogue ' had been 

 too much frightened at that to go near it, for his foot- 

 prints stopped some yards off and then turned aside. 

 Otherwise the wreck was complete ; every hut was down, 



