Pelts 



and boulder to boulder with the agility of moun- 

 tain goats. As they came on they struck the 

 trunks of the trees with their small axes, or 

 flogged the dense, thorny thickets. Kols and 

 Santals these men consisted of, merry fellows 

 who jested and joked and laughed as they came 

 forward. Deadly with the bow and arrow or 

 their little axes are these jungle men, as many 

 a hare or small mammal getting up in these 

 beats has found to its cost. Their little axe they 

 can throw with an incredibly unerring dexterity 

 worthy of Cooper's Red Indians. 



Any trivial incident was enough to amuse the 

 beaters in front of me, and to provoke a roar of 

 laughter. The whole idea of a beat to them was 

 pure pleasure. Down they came. Now they 

 had reached the caves. Volleys of stones and 

 curses were hurled into the cave openings, but 

 to my intense chagrin nothing save two owls 

 emerged, and the beat ended blank ! 



The next beat was about i|- miles away, and 

 we climbed on to the elephant to' take us there. 

 On arriving at our destination, we found two 

 machans crowning the crest of a low-toppejd hill, 

 which formed the outlying spur from a much 

 higher range, the others being placed down its 

 flank. The idea was, I understood, to beat out 

 some caves on the higher hill and drive the bears 

 past the machans situated from top to bottom 

 of the lower spur. My lot gave me the upper- 



287 



