THE MAHADEO HILLS 89 



sometimes found on level ground, he is essentially a lover 

 of tills, and always retreats to them when disturbed; 

 extensive ranges of forest little disturbed by man or tame 

 cattle, for, unlike the buffalo, he cannot tolerate the 

 proximity of man and his works; a plentiful supply of 

 water and green herbage; and lastly, so far as I have 

 observed, the presence of the bamboo, on which he con- 

 stantly browses. In the Central Provinces of India all 

 these conditions are unfortunately still present over 

 enormous tracts of country. Thousands of square miles 

 in the Central range, much of which will one day be 

 reclaimed to the uses of the plough, are now the very 

 perfection of a preserve for the bison. 



Perhaps he is nowhere more completely at home than 

 in the Mahadeo hills. There; as a general rule, he will be 

 found to frequent at any season the highest elevation at 

 which he can then find food and water. During the cold 

 season succeeding the monsoon, they remain much about 

 the higher plateaux, at an elevation of 2000 to 3000 feet, 

 where they graze all night on the bamboos that clothe 

 their sides, and on the short, succulent grasses fringing 

 the springs and streams usually found in the intervening 

 hollows._ They generally pass the day on the tops of the 

 plateaux, lying down in secure positions under the shade 

 of small trees, where they chew the cud and sleep. Their 

 object in lying under tree's seems more the concealment 

 thus afiorded to their large and dark-coloured bodies 

 than shelter from the sun, as the shade is seldom dense, 

 and a secure windy position is always secured irrespective 

 of the sun. I have observed that single animals always 

 lie looking down wind, leaving the up wind direction to be 

 guarded by their keen sense of smell; and, in my ex- 

 perience, it is far easier to baflSe their sense of vision in a 

 direct approach, than to stalk them down wind, however 

 carefully the approach may be covered. It is extra- 

 ordinary how difl&cult it often is to distinguish so strongly 

 coloured an object as a bull bison when thus lying down in 

 the flickering shadow of a tree. 



The colour of the cows is a light chestnut brown in the 

 cold weather, becoming darker as the season advances. 



