MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 1069 



Mr. Pitman's experience of Chinkara drinking is very interesting. In 

 his recent book Mr. Stebbing notes that the Chinkara is a desert animal and 

 the more dry and sandy a place the better it suits him. Personally 

 though I have often seen deer drinking, I have never seen an antelope do 

 so, neither a BluebuU, a Black buck, a Fourhorn nor a Chinkara. They are 

 keen on perennial streams and their neighbourhood, but chiefly for the 

 sake of fresh young grass. In my experience antelopes are much harder 

 than deer, and I have attributed this partly to the fact that they seldom 

 drink water. I should be glad to hear whether anyone else has seen an 

 antelope drink ? 



F. DEWAR, i.c.s. 

 Balaghat, C. p., Uk May 1912. 



No. VII .—RECOVERY OF ANIMALS FROM INJURIES. 



In some of your recent issues I have seen notes of some remarkable 

 recoveries from injuries in beasts and birds. The other day two such cases 

 came to my notice. The first was a Sambhur stag, full grown, which was 

 going perfectly well and sound when I shot him. On examination I saw a 

 large hard thickening in the bone of the ofi" hind leg below the hock. I 

 skinned the part carefully and found that the bone had been fractured and 

 set again without any shortening. From its appearance it must have been 

 when the animal was quite young. 



The second case was a solitary boar which I shot. He was a big beast 

 35^" at the shoulder with good tusks. There was a healed scar on his right 

 shoulder and a soft lump which turned out to be an abscess full of foetid 

 matter. Thinking it an old bullet wound I examined further and found 

 the point of a boar's tusk about 2f" long firmly embedded in the bone of the 

 shoulder blade where it had snapped oft" short. The external wound had 

 healed up completely and the animal showed no signs of lameness. 



W. J. H. BALLANTINE, 



Assistant Political Officer. 

 Sadiya, Upper Assam, 

 bth January 1912. 



No. VIII.— NOTE ON TAKIN {BUDORCAS TAXICOLOR). 



With 2 Plates. 



In July of last year when just north of the Mishmi Hills at an altitude of 

 about 10,000 feet, I was fortunate in finding a jolace frequented by a herd of 

 Takin. This herd about 300 in number spent each night in the vicinity of 

 a hot spring drinking the water and browsing on the trees around it. I 



