168 SPORT IN ASIA AND AFRICA 



Chanda district, and also a good panther in 

 Yeotmal, which I got in a beat ; but the season's 

 shoot was in another respect an unlucky one. 

 I lost the finest panther I have ever seen by a 

 combination of bad luck and mismanagement, 

 and, as he had killed a man a day or two before, 

 it was particularly annoying. 



I sat up for him over a kill with Mrs. Hart, 

 and he came before dark, offering me a shot, 

 which I particularly fancy, a diagonal shot 

 through the shoulder. The machan had, however, 

 been tied very high from the ground, and the 

 bullet, on striking the shoulder, ran down the 

 leg instead of passing into the body. The panther 

 was knocked over and lay on his back with his 

 legs in the air motionless, and, thinking he was 

 finished, I very stupidly did not put a second 

 bullet into him. When I turned to speak to Mrs. 

 Hart he recovered consciousness, and got away 

 with a shattered shoulder. 



We followed him on the next day, and I had 

 a glimpse of him in the grass, but unfortunately 

 I was on a pad-elephant, and although I can 

 shoot very fairly well from a howdah, I never 

 have been able to shoot from a sitting position on a 

 pad-elephant, and I fired and missed him. The 

 mahout then took the elephant in the wrong 

 direction ; and, as the bleeding had stopped, 

 the panther could not again be found. 



I also missed two tigers. We had one beat 

 in the Yeotmal district in which a tiger was in the 

 beat. Malcolm had a shot at him, but missed, 

 and the tiger passed to the rear of the machans, 

 and stood offering me a fairly good shot. I 



