The Deer Trib( 



287 



troops of from four to a dozen, or singly, 

 while during the rutting-season the animals 

 rove in more considerable herds. In jungle 

 and thickly forested regions it is a hard 

 matter to come up witfi the sambar on foot, 

 and it is there usually shot from elephant- 

 back, by the aid of beaters. In more 

 open hill country it affords good stalking. 

 In Ceylon it is hunted with hounds, and 

 yields in this way also capital sport. These 

 animals seem to revel in heat, and love 

 to shelter themselves in hot, stifling valleys ; 

 they drink only once in two or three days. 

 Ft is a iroticeable feature in connection 

 with the antlers of the sandbar that they 

 are not invariably shed annually, as with 

 most of the deer kind. In Ceylon, accord- 

 ing to Sir Samuel Baker, they are shed 

 "with great irregularity every third or 

 fourth year." 



Lieutenant-Colonel IJeginald Heber Percy 

 thus writes concerning the sambar, or sam- 

 bur : " Compared with the Kashmir stag, 

 red deer, or wapiti, he looks an ugly. 



fWf'i 



Vhoto hij Minx E. J. Beck. 



FOEMOSAX SIKA STA<;. 

 Like it.s .T;L]i.aDese kindred, this Jeer is sputted only in suninier. 



This deer 



rAX EUSA STl 

 of the sambar, 

 type of antler. 



lias a somewhat different 



coarse, underbred brute. ... As the sambur 

 is almost entirely nocturnal in its habits, it 

 is most commonly shot in drives, and in many 

 places it is almost impossible to obtain 

 sambur otherwise; but where it can be 

 managed, stalking is, of course, far better fun. 

 The sportsman should be on his ground just 

 before daylight, and work slowly through the 

 forest at the edge of the feeding-groiuids, 

 taking the bottom of the hill if there are 

 croj^s on the jilaiu below, or, failing these, 

 the edges of the open glades in the forest. 

 Presently, if there are any sambur about, he 

 will hear their trumpet-like call, and, creejj- 

 ing on, see two or three dark forms moving 

 among the trees. In the grey of the morn- 

 ing it is often very hard to distinguish a 

 stag from a hind, and the writer has on 

 several occasions had to wait, after \'ie\ving 

 the herd, till there was light enough to 

 pick his stag. Even in broad daylight it is 

 difficult to judge the size of a stag's liorns 

 as he stands motionless in the deep gloom 

 of the forest, and what little can be seen 



