CHAPTER II. 

 OORIAL, 



FROM the yarns given in the previous article it will be seen that the "450 

 rifle was eminently suited for black-buck at any rate ; so we will change 

 the venue to the hot, arid hills of the Punjab, where the oorial roains 

 many miles from water, apparently never suffering from thirst, and you 

 shall judge whether it is the weapon you would like when in his 

 vicinity. 



At the end of one hot weather I was very low in spirits through having 

 no shots at four-legged game for over twelve months, so determined to 

 try a range I had seen during my wanderings on duty some time before. 

 I sent for my syce and arranged how the relays of ponies were to be laid 

 on my route, and having obtained three days' leave, drove off in the well- 

 known bamboo -cart, two days later. It was a hot evening in September, 

 and much more likely to drive fellows to the high hills of the Himalayas 

 than to the low red ranges running out into the bare, burnt-up Punjab. 

 Company I could have none ; but when one is accustomed to wild shooting, 

 there can be no feeling of ennui because one is alone; it is the total 

 absence of the game one is in search of that produces that most distress- 

 ing complaint. 



As the air of the evening met niy face, I felt decidedly cooler and more 

 comfortable ; but when I reached the solitary rest-house where I had to 

 await the morning light to start with the shikarie of the place in search of 

 a suitable site for the tent, the air was hot as from a furnace and my 

 throat dry and rough. At dawn there was a much colder feeling about, 

 and we soon started off with a large mussuck (leather bag) full of 

 water, borne by one of the shikarie's proverbial " bhais " (brothers). A 

 bottle of cold tea, made in the only good way for assuaging a hot hunter's 

 thirst, was slung from the shikari's shoulder in a long woollen stocking, 

 well wetted. We had a hot march to the range, about three miles, and 

 then, having sent the tent, &c., to the very top of a saddle between two 

 points, where any chance breeze could be felt, we clambered up a spur, 

 in the shade of the rocks above until near the summit. We turned 

 west along the range, and studied many a corrie and ravine, seeing nothing 

 but females and puny males. By eleven o'clock the cold tea was exhausted, 

 and the sun so powerful that I was glad indeed to reach the tent and 

 throw myself on a bare bedstead with the wind blowing over and deceiving 

 me as to its temperature There was little appetite during those hot 

 hours, and much water was drunk, and more soaked up by a towel tied 



