282 SPORT IN BENGAL. 



or two fired by M. announced that the rhinoceros had been 

 found, and warned us to be prepared. Ten minutes more 

 passed in silence, during which the elephants, frightened 

 out of the jungle at the first sight of their much dreaded 

 enemy, had been brought again into line under proper 

 control, and we, who were waiting outside with fingers 

 on the triggers of our rifles, and eyes searching the open- 

 ings in the covert, were becoming impatient, when D., 

 who was on the extreme right up the water-course, was 

 seen to dart out from his ambuscade, and, running some dis- 

 tance westward, to fire two shots in rapid succession at a 

 huge bull rhinoceros, which was making off at full speed in 

 the open fields beyond D. Dashing to my right, I obtained 

 a couple of shots with a heavy rifle at a long range, but my 

 hand being unsteady from running, one ball missed altogether, 

 dropping beneath him, and the other told loudly on some spot 

 forward, but not fatally. D. R. S. also fired without effect, and 

 although we followed the cowardly brute on a bloody trail for 

 two or three miles up to the bit of forest above mentioned, 

 and afterwards some way into it, we saw no more of him. 



Our disappointment at such a termination of an adventure 

 commencing so auspiciously was extreme. M. had come upon 

 the rhinoceros fast asleep in the covert, and was about to 

 fire, when the elephants were put to flight on its rising up 

 suddenly in front of them, not one of them being a trained 

 " howdah " carrier, and its snorts proving too much for their 

 nerves. However, he fired a random shot or two over the 

 stern of his elephant as it bolted with the rest, and thought 

 that one ball took effect somewhere or other, he could not tell 

 where, probably in the back. The wind blowing in our faces 

 the beast certainly could not have scented us, and we lay very 

 still too, but he may, on reaching the skirts of the covert, have 

 caught a glimpse of something to cause him to turn away 

 westward, and so have escaped us. D. got two barrels at 

 him from a hundred yards, and being a steady marksman 

 could hardly have missed him altogether ; however, he got 

 away without leaving much blood on his tracks, and the pace 



