* Appendix, Note H.

" I was much applauded by the shikarees for sticking to and spearing the boar in such a thick cover, and they looked upon the colt as a paragon of horseflesh. The poor little beast, however, was much torn by the thorns, and considerably knocked about in other ways ; so I sent for my second horse an old, experienced hunter and despatched the young one to the tents, well satisfied with his performance.

" We next crossed the river, and beat a considerable tract of high fields, cultivated by well-irrigation, in the neighbourhood of a village about a couple of miles from the jungle.

" Pig were said to be there and moving about, but we could make nothing of them, and at last gave it up as a bad job.

" On our return, however, we beat another isolated field, but it proved also a blank, and we were riding quietly towards our tents when a tremendous hooroosh from the further end of the field attracted my attention, I had loitered'behind, and was a considerable distance in rear of my companions; so was the only one who galloped off to the end of the field, and was there informed that a boar was in view. I rode ahead, and shortly saw a large hog in the distance on the open plain, taking it very easily. Apparently he had left the fields we had before beaten, and was making for the jungle. Telling the men to call up the other sahibs, I dashed away in pursuit.

" Had the boar been aware of the imminence of the danger, and made a better use of his long start and natural speed, he would have reached the jungle before I could have overtaken him; but deeming himself unpursued, and rid of the disagreeable noise of the beaters, he jogged on the even tenor of his way at a moderate pace till, suddenly cocking his ears as I approached, he notified that he had become aware that his confidence had been misplaced.

" A quick, side-long glance quickly showed him the risk he had run, and with a surly grunt he lay out at a pace which, for a brief space, kept him well ahead. But a long canter over the plain in the midday sun had shorn him of a portion of his original freshness, and I gradually, but perceptibly, crept closer to him.

He felt this, and made every exertion to reach a small field of high grain, which. stood on the banks of the river, in the neighbourhood of the jungle. This he managed to do, but only a few lengths in advance of me. Though thick, the grain did not altogether conceal him, and I pushed him about in it, turning and twisting in every direction, till, fairly bothered, he took to some low scrub which grew pretty thick and plentiful on the bank of the river. This was on the side opposite to that on which the jungle was situated.

" Here my friends who had for some time been unaware of my being in chase, but subsequently made a short cut towards me joined, and I began to fear I should after all lose the spear. But I was now on better terms with the hog, and managed to run up, got a fair chance, and succeeded in pricking him. One of my companions about this time went down, horse and all, bodily into a bush. I speared a second time, and turned the boar, who now slipped down the bank and went into the river. He revelled for a short time in the water, and when I managed to scramble down, there he was, evidently enjoying a pleasant bath and drink. I lost no time in riding towards him up the river, which may have been there a couple of feet in depth. Disturbed in an agreeable roll by my approach, he sprang up, and stood with eyes glaring, and forefeet firmly fixed, ready for a dash at me when I came within reach. When I arrived within three or four lengths, he came at me full swing amidst a storm of spray. I received him on my spear, but it only entered his fore-arm, and passed through the flesh. It was not sufficient to stop him, and I felt him strike the sole of my boot and stirrup-iron ; and, as I afterwards found, he tore my spur off. With my spear still through his leg, however, I shoved him round, and kept him from ripping at my horse. Eventually, as I pressed my horse out of the way, I pulled the boar over, and, withdrawing my spear, moved ahead. He quickly recovered himself, made up the bank, and entered the jungle, where I was not long in following him. My companion was riding a pony, having either lamed his hunter, or changed it when we rode towards the tents, and the brute steadily refused to go down into the nullah. Spurring and punching with the butt-end of the spear was of not the slightest avail. At last, in an almost allowable fit of anger, he gave the beast a dig in the rump with the point, and this had so persuasive an effect, that down at last it went into the river, and up the opposite bank.

"In the meantime I had run the pig into the jungle up a narrow path, but he turned and came partly back. I kept well in hand, waiting for an opportunity to dash up on a bit of open, and get a good thrust. The boar, however, now shut up in a bush, whence he charged out at my friend as he came up. He was received on his spear, which got jammed in the ribs, and while thus entangled, I got close, gave a decisive blow, and the action was over.

" Both the boars were very good ones, with tushes of about seven inches. But during the space of time which elapsed between the death of the last and the arrival of the men, in search of whom we shortly went, some villager, or possibly one of the beaters themselves, managed to break off one of the tushes of the last hog, leaving only the stump."

" What use do you suppose he would make of it ? " asked Vivian.

" Preserve it as a charm, I believe, and use it as an effective article of application in some cases of disease. For pigs' blood some of the low outcasts have great veneration. They are fully impressed with its strengthening powers. I have seen a man, directly the boar was disembowelled, plunge his head into the cavity, and drink at the blood. He and others also dipped the ends of puggrees and rags into it to give to their children to suck. It is, in their estimation, a fine strengthening tonic, and a specific against some of the ills to which flesh is heir."

"I suppose," said Mowbray, "that they consider that some medicinal properties are contained in both tush and blood, and hold them in esteem, as other tribes do the fat and certain portions of tigers and bears. The claws of the former are in high estimation as charms. Even a tolerably well-educated man in so superior a station of life as that of an apothecary, and a Mussulman into the bargain, once asked me for a pair to fasten round the arm of his child. If not looked after, the claws of a dead tiger will disappear very quickly. I remember once, when beating for tigers, the men came across the remains of a dead one a rare occurrence by the way. I went to inspect the spot, which was under an overhanging block of stone.

The head and teeth were tolerably perfect, and many bones and bits of skin were about, but the claws were for the most part absent, doubtless seized at first by the men themselves. They considered that the tiger had died from fighting with another, for by the teeth it was not an aged one. They one and all declared that no one could have shot it. No sahib had ever shikared that part of the country, which was in the Boondee Raj, and they themselves were not permitted to fire at wild animals. The latter reason, of course, would account for their attributing the cause of death to other than a shot-wound, but they really appeared to believe what they said."

" Well, to return to our pigs," said Norman. " I was rather disappointed to-day at getting so few kills. I have known three large boars to be killed before breakfast by a party of three out of this jungle. And another man and myself actually speared six pig of various sizes one afternoon, though three of them escaped into the jungle wounded. Both of these occasions were during the hot weather, however. That season is decidedly the best, for the pig then assemble in the jungle, sometimes in great numbers, and it being thinner, they are more easily driven from it."

" And the chances are greatly against the pig," observed Stewart. " It is almost as great a certainty as the plain in the neighbourhood of Kutwarra, near Ahmedabad, of which I have before spoken, if you get away at all on fair terms. I once saw a very dirty advantage taken of a sounder at that place. Six pig were killed, and all sows, one of them big with young."

" A rank, unsportsmanlike deed," ejaculated Norman, indignantly. " It is my opinion that, as a general rule, sows ought not to be speared. Now and then, of course, killing them is unavoidable, and, indeed, quite legitimate, especially in such a case, for instance, as that of the Phoolrea sow, or when, at the end of a day of little sport, sows break without any boar. But killing a sow with young ! It's positively infamous! I am preparing a set of rules, and shall submit them for approval directly we return to Bhooj. The spearing of sows I shall especially refer to. Our recent experiences, and our many discussions and anecdotes have brought so many points prominently to notice, and placed the sport as a whole so fully before me, that I have been able to draw up a few regulations such as I hope all sportsmen will approve of."