Dr. W. H. Russell, the famous war correspondent, who in his letters to The Times during the Crimean war did so much good service, was a most delightful companion. He is remembered by all who knew him, both for his talents and for his sympathetic and affectionate disposition and his unfailing sense of humour. He was one of my greatest friends. During the voyage, he occupied the cabin next to mine.
The Prince having requested him to provide himself with a uniform, Dr. Russell designed a kind of Ambassadorial dress of great splendour, with so generous a gold stripe to his kersey breeches, that we told him he had gold trousers with a white stripe inside. These effulgent garments unfortunately carried away when the doctor was climbing upon an elephant, on his way to a Durbar. I executed temporary repairs upon his person with safety pins; and implored him not to stoop. But when it came to his turn to bow, bow he must; the jury rig parted, and a festoon of white linen, of extraordinary length, waved behind him. Fortunately, the assembled Indian Princes thought it was part of his uniform.
At Mian Mir, during the ceremony of a great review of troops, Dr. Russell, who was riding among the suite mounted on a half-broken Arab, was suddenly heard to shout, "Whoa, you villainous brute!" At the same moment, several of the suite were knocked endways. The Arab then got the bit in his teeth, and tore away past the Prince down the whole line. Dr. Russell's helmet was jerked to the back of his head, his puggaree unfurled in a long train floating behind him, he vanished into the distance and we did not see him again until dinner-time. He passed so close to the Prince, that had the doctor another thickness of gold on his gold trousers, there would have been an accident to his Royal Highness.
The Duke of Sutherland, during the Prince's journeys overland in India, took an intense delight in driving the engine, from which it was hard to tear him away. We had halted at a station where the customary ceremonial had been arranged, and had changed into uniform, all save the Duke, who was nowhere to be seen.
"Where can he be?" said the Prince.
I submitted that he might be on the engine, and went to see. Sure enough, the Duke was sitting on the rail, his red shirt flung open, his sun-helmet on the back of his head. In either black fist he grasped a handful of cotton waste, with which he was mopping up the perspiration of honest toil. He hurried to his carriage to change into uniform; and presently appeared, buttoning his tunic with one hand. In the other he still grasped a skein of cotton waste. The Prince looked at him.
"Can nothing be done?" said the Prince sadly.
The great elephant hunt in Nepal took place on the 25th February, 1876, under the auspices of Sir Jung Bahadur (afterwards the Maharaja Sir Jung Bahadur, G.C.B., G.C.S.I.). A herd of wild elephants, captained by a male of gigantic size and valour, who had already vanquished Sir Jung's most formidable righting elephants, had been tracked down in the forest. Sir Jung determined that, come what would, he should be captured. Sir Jung led the Prince and several of his suite, all well mounted on horses, into the forest, to the rendezvous, to which the wild herd was to be driven. But in the meantime, the big elephant had given the hunters the slip.
I was of the hunting party, and I had the stiffest run of my life, and at the end of it there were left besides myself only my companion—I think he was Mr. Greenwood—and six Indian notables. Mounted on swift pad elephants, we pursued that tremendous beast at top speed from four o'clock in the morning till six in the evening, bursting through the jungle, splashing through rivers, climbing the rocky steeps of hills upon which there appeared to be no foothold except for monkeys, and down which the elephants slid upon their bellies. So we rode hour after hour, hanging on the ropes secured to the guddee, lying flat upon the steed's back to avoid being scraped off his back by branches, until the quarry, escaping us ran straight into Sir Jung Bahadur's party of horsemen.
There, in an open space set with sword-like reeds, stood the elephant, his flanks heaving, his head and trunk moving from side to side. He had one huge tusk and the stump of the other.