MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 815 



The song in the third number of the Oriental Sporting Magazine " In 

 that blest land of freedom from whence we all came " was written by a 

 Col. Sheeldham. The initials H. W. R. to some papers on Hog Hunting are 

 those of Harry Reeves of the Bombay Civil Service. He was afterwards a 

 member of the Bombay Council and died about 1862. According to these 

 accounts sows used to be speared as well as boars, though in Bengal such 

 a proceeding was punished by a tine. I find the following rules were in 

 force in 1835 in Bengal : — 



Rule 1st. — Any person spearing a sow wilfully except in self defence to 

 forfeit two dozen claret to the party and to ride no more that day. 



2nd. — ^Any person spearing a sow accidentally to forfeit one dozen claret 

 to the party. 



3rd. — Whoever sees the boar first to give the Tally-ho before starting 

 after him. 



4th. — No person to pass another who is within spearing distance of the 

 boar and waiting for the charge but to lay behind him and take his turn 

 should the boar jink. 



5th. — No one to spear a boar until he charges except close to jungle and 

 there is a chance of the boar getting away if you do not. 



6th. — Any person taking first spear is to remain with the boar till killed 

 or disabled under penalty of losing his claims to the tusks. 



7th. — When a sounder breaks covert not more than two persons to ride 

 the same boar. 



8th. — No person allowed to throw his spear on any pretence. 

 With reference to the last rule it appears from a book published in 1827, 

 Sketches of Indian Field Sports, that throwing the spear (the Bengal one) 

 was not only once allowed but enforced in fact, it is stated, it is not fair to 

 job or spear the hog without quitting hold of the spear and full instructions 

 are given with illustrations how to hold and throw the spear. The author 

 of this book, Daniel Johnson, states in the preface that he left India in 1809, 

 so his account of hog hunting refers to a period before that date. Captain 

 Williamson in his Oriental Field Sports published early in the last century 

 also mentions throwing the spear as the ordinary mode of attacking a boar, 

 stabbing as ho calls it, only being resorted to when throwing was not prac- 

 ticable. 



The Calcutta Journal of Natural History was conducted very much 

 on the lines of our own Journal. I find from it that the Thaming, 

 Thamin or Eld's deer, Cervus eldii, was first discovered in 1838 in Manipur 

 by Lieut. Eld, Assistant Commissioner of Assam, although it was first brought 

 to the notice of the world by Capt. Guthrie. There are also excellent 

 articles in this journal on the Bear Ursus lahatus and Ursus isabellinus, 

 on the Afghan wild-sheep and goats, on the Thibet wild-ass and wolf, on 

 the Indian wild-dog and the four-horned antelopes which, I think, our 

 journal should reprint, as the Calcutta Journal of Natural History is not 

 easily got. Most of these articles are illustrated with curious lithographic 

 prints of the animals or their horns and there is a very interesting note 

 on the skeletons of the Avild-dog, the pariah-dog and the jackall (sic). 

 In the India Sporting Review, 1849, there are figured a pair of shed samber 

 horns which weighed 25 lbs., an extraordinary weight. I have a thick 

 single shed horn, 41 inches long and 8 inches thinnest part of the beam, 

 which weighs 7 lbs. 13 oz. and the horns of one I shot with, a small piece of 

 the frontal bone weighs 19 lbs. The latter is figured in our journal, vol. 17, 

 p. 24. The right horn of the pair that weighed 25 lbs. has each upper tine 

 bifurcated, the left horn has the outer tine bifurcated. They measure 10-J- 

 inches immediately about { ? above) the burr and 8 inches midway up the 

 brain and are 4i2 inches in length. They are stated to have been obtained 



