the plains is a
sight never to be forgotten: it is the nearest thing to flying. The
bucks with their twisted black horns and blackish brown coats and white
underneath, the does cream-coloured and white, almost invisible against
the soil in the glare of light. All spring into the air with their feet
tucked up at the same spot, with a spurt of dust as if a bullet had
struck the soil beneath their feet. You see poor sheep trying to do the
same thing.

Some natives carry the dead buck. We have about five miles to tramp,
partly over waste ground, partly, along almost unshaded road. After
three miles the deer carriers sit down and "light up" under a tree, so
we follow their example, and send a message on for the carriage.

The men are joined by various native wayfarers who stop and pass the
time of day: they light a little smouldering fire of leaves and twigs to
keep the sociable pipe going. It is a little earthen cup without a stem;
they hold this in the points of their fingers and suck the smoke between
their thumbs so the pipe touches no one's lips, and they have a drink
from a well, poured from a bowl into the palms of their hands. My Hindoo
shikari I find will take a nip with pleasure from my flask in his little
brass bowl, but he would loose caste if he took soda water in the same
way, so he tramps to the well and at great trouble draws a cup. The tall
snub-nosed Mohammedan looks on with scorn at the inconsistency and
touches neither water nor spirit.

We have a longish wait, but there's lots to look at, still new to me.
The girls and boys at the well, and weeding the barley, a vulture and
its ugly mate on household affairs bent, in a tree, and green parrots
and squirrels all busy. It seems to me the squirrels are rooting out the
white ants from their earthy works up the tree trunks above me. Possibly
they are just doing it to put dust in my eyes.

Then we drive homewards, the buck on the splashboard, and pass a
splendid group of peacocks and peahens under two small trees, nearly a
dozen of them within seventy yards, and I handle my big rifle, then my
Browning Colt, and nearly fire, for I'd fain add a peacock to my
pistol-bag, but they look so tremendously domestic that I haven't the
heart, and besides, they are sacred I am told, and possibly it would be
unlucky to shoot them. My men say "shoot," but not encouragingly, and
its my unlucky day; I'd possibly miss, and hit a native beyond. How you
manage to fire a bull