he
sniffs first, but you don't hear that until after it is done. Men have
heard that sniff as they lay under a horse that was kicking its life
out; yet the sniff really sounded while they were still in the
saddle--the horse still whole.

All the words that have to do with this sport are ugly. It's more like
a snort than a sniff. . . . You really must see it. A trampled place
in the jungle--tusker at bay---a mounted sticker on each side waiting
for the move. The tusker stands still. He looks nowhere, out of eyes
like burning cellars. That is as near as you can come with
words--trapdoors opening into cellars, smoke and flame below.

At this moment you are like a negative, being exposed. There is filmed
among your enduring pictures thereafter, the raking curving snout,
yellow tusks, blue bristling hollows from which the eyes burn. The
lances glint green from the creepers. . . .

Then the flick of the head that goes with the snort. The boar isn't
there--lanced doubtless. . . . Yes, the cavalry "cracks" get him for
the most part and then you hear men's laughter and bits of comment and
the strike of a match or two, for very much relished cigarettes. But
now and then, the scene shifts too quickly and the _other_ rider may
see his friend's mount stand up incredibly gashed--a white horse
possibly--and this _other_ must charge and lance true right now, for
the boar is waiting for the man in the saddle to come down.

Nobody ever thinks of the boar's part. Queer about that. It's the bad
revolting curve that goes with a tusker's snout, in the sag of which
the eye is set, that puts him out of reach of decent regard. Only two
other curves touch it for malignity--the curve of a hyena's shoulder
and the curve of a shark's jaw. Three scavengers that haven't had a
real chance. They weren't bred right.

Among the visitors that came in for the jungle play was Ian Deal, one
of the younger of Carlin's seven brothers; one of the two who hadn't
appeared for her marriage. The other missing brother was in Australia,
but Ian Deal had been in India at the time of the ceremony and not the
full-length of India away. Skag had thought about this; Carlin had
doubtless done more than that. Once she had flushed, when someone had
marked Ian's absence to the point of speaking of it. Before that, Skag
had only heard that Ian was one of the best-loved of all. . . .

He watched the meeting of the brother and sister. It was at the