126 BIG-GAME SHOOTING IN UPPER BURMA 



who knew the country and were very sanguine 

 of finding rhino. To make a long story short, I 

 travelled for ten days over practically virgin 

 ground; but though I hunted high and low, I 

 only once found tracks of rhino, and those were 

 three weeks old. The beasts had evidently 

 forsaken that line of country for the time being. 

 I did, however, get bison, and once came on a 

 pair of tigers spooning in a nullah ; but they were 

 off before I could get a shot. 



This, then, is my experience of hunting 

 rhino in Burma, and, as the reader may see, it 

 was not a happy one. But I was undoubtedly 

 unlucky, and was handicapped, moreover, in 

 being unable to make a really long journey to 

 ranges which B. sumatrensis has selected as his 

 permanent habitat. 



As regards the best time of year during 

 which to hunt rhino, I should say the months of 

 April and May are the most suitable. A rhino 

 lives in very dense jungle, and in the cold 

 weather the hunter would be greatly handicapped 

 by the thick undergrowth. It would be quite 

 impossible to travel about in heavy jungle during 

 the rains. In the hot weather, the rhinoceros, 

 from all accounts, spends most of the day in 

 mud wallows, which, when found, afford a clue 

 to the animal's approximate whereabouts should 

 the wallow itself be deserted for the time being. 

 Tracking, of course, in the hot weather is sure 



