80 TWO YEARS IlSr THE JUNGLE. 



spent at Shekoabad, eight antelopes, four bucks, and four does were 

 called upon to yield up their skins and skeletons. There is really 

 very little sport in hunting the sasin antelope, because of the un- 

 'Wariness of the animal and the ease with which they are approached. 

 Any one who is a moderately accurate rifle-shot at one hundred and 

 fifty yards can usually kill from two to five in a day, and if the 

 hunter is really bloodthirsty he may bring down a good many more 

 than that, but as far as real sport is concerned, it is tame. There 

 is no excellent sport without great labor on the part of some one. 



Upon returning to Etawah, I packed up my collection and 

 shipped it to Calcutta, then took a little holiday trip up to Agra 

 to see the famous Taj Mehal. Ever since the days of Heber, trav- 

 ellers have lavished adjectives and similes upon this pretty tomb, 

 some because they were sincere, and all the rest because it is the 

 fashion to do so. In my opinion, no other structure in the world 

 has been so greatly over-praised. I can only account for it by the 

 infrequency of really fine and well-finished specimens of architect- 

 ure in India. The abundance of mud-huts and characteristic Hindoo 

 temples make this really beautiful structure seem to be the most 

 ravishingly beautiful one on the face of the earth. Hence the in- 

 coherent ravings, and the constant strain uj)on the English language 

 on account of the Taj. I do not believe half the travellers who 

 have written about it were really sincere in such a superlative de- 

 gree of admiration and rapture as they have expressed. It is like 

 the ravings over the expression of the Sphinx — a face with the eyes, 

 nose, and lips hammered into one unsightly blur, which looks as if 

 some wild animal had been tearing it. Look at the photographs 

 lof it, if you cannot get the object itself. 



> What are the elements which make up this "dream in marble," 

 this "psalm in stone," this "essence of architectural beauty," this 

 Taj in fact ? It has not size certainly, for its width covers only one 

 hundred and fifty feet each way. Its dome is a huge marble ' ' chattie " 

 turned bottom uppermost, with bulging sides and contracted base, 

 an exact model of the useful vessel the gentle Hindoo boils his rice 

 in. The building is square, except that the corners are cut oflf, 

 and the upper half of the walls are set with huge, empty niches, as 

 though they were prepared for statues that were never put in place. 



The minarets on the corners of the terrace are low, dumpy, and 

 plain, and in shape and size are as much like some of the light-houses 

 on our Atlantic sea-board as one billiard ball is like another. But 

 the Taj (as well as the minarets) is built of white marble, which 



