In comparison with Asirgarh, Buxa was quite a gay place. I was seldom alone in it, and generally had at least one other white man with me. We were kept in touch with the outside world by a telegraph line, which, however, was constantly being broken by trees blown down by storms or uprooted by elephants. Once a day a sturdy little Bhuttia postman toiled up the hill with our letters. "His Majesty's Mail" carried for his protection a short spear with bells on it to scare wild beasts; but this did not save him from being occasionally stopped by wild elephants and once being treed by a tiger. For sport we had to descend to the forest; though sometimes a barking deer wandered into our gardens from the jungle, and from the Mess veranda we shot a couple on the hill-side across a deep nullah or ravine.
Between my bungalow and the Married Officers' Quarters ran another nullah. Occasionally, when there was no moon, a panther used to wander down it, calling like a cat in the darkness which was too intense to allow me a shot at the animal. When we came to Buxa we had wondered why the windows of our houses were covered with strong wire netting, and were inclined to be sceptical when told that this was to keep predatory beasts out. But the Punjabi subaltern had been awakened one night by the noise of some animal moving about his room in the Mess, he having left his door open. He seized a handful of matches, struck them and saw a panther scared by the sudden blaze dash out through the door. And twice during our sojourn in Buxa did a similar thing happen.
This particular panther, for we assumed that it was always the same animal, haunted the Station and preyed on the dogs in the bazaar. One day on the road just below the fort it met one of my sepoys who promptly climbed the nearest tree and remained in the topmost branches until his shouts brought some other men to the rescue. Once at night I was roused from sleep by wild cries from a Bhuttia's hut on the spur above our Mess and learned on inquiry that the panther had carried off his dog. Another time, in brilliant moonlight, an Indian doctor then in medical charge of the detachment, who lived in the bungalow next to mine, saw the beast sitting in the small garden intently watching the door of an outhouse in which a milch-goat was kept shut up. The doctor ran indoors to fetch his gun and had an unsuccessful shot at it as it jumped the hedge. Needless to say we made many efforts to compass its death. One night it killed a goat tied up as a bait to a tree within fifteen yards of the fort and was wounded by a native officer waiting for it behind the wall. Yet not long afterwards it climbed into the fort at night and carried off a sepoy's dog. Many a time I sat up in a tree over a bleating goat in the moonlight, but always in vain; and I suppose that panther still lives to afford sport to our successors in Buxa.
Life was well worth living on the days when we could descend into the forest for a shoot. At dawn we started down the three miles of steep road to Santrabari where the elephants awaited us. For work in the jungle these animals, instead of the howdahs or cage-like structures with seats which they carry on shoots in fairly open country, have only their pads, thick, straw-stuffed mattresses bound on their backs by stout ropes. For in dense forest howdahs would soon be swept off. When we arrived at the Peelkhana the mahouts made the huge beasts kneel down, or we clambered up, either by hauling oneself up by the tail, aided by one foot on the hind leg held up for the purpose at the driver's command, or by catching hold of the ears from the front and standing on the curled-up trunk which then raised us up on to the elephant's head. One either sat sideways on the pad or astride above the shoulders and behind the mahout who rode on the neck with his bare feet behind the ears. Then our giant steeds lumbered off into the forest with an awkward, disjointed stride which is sorely trying to the novice. And sitting upright with nothing to rest the back against for eight hours or more, shaken violently all the time by the jerky motion, is decidedly tiring. Prepared for beast or bird, each of us carried a rifle and a shot-gun, and, separating from the others, went his own way through the forest. Sometimes a sambhur, the big Indian stag, was the bag; sometimes a wild boar. Perhaps a khakur, the small, alert barking deer, of which the flesh is infinitely more tender than a sambhur's, or a few jungle fowl, rewarded our efforts. We carried with us food and water for the day and did not return until evening. Then, after leaving the elephants at the Peelkhana, came the fifteen-hundred-feet climb up the steep road to Buxa. And in a long chair in the Mess the fatigues of the day were forgotten in the pleasure of recounting every incident of the sport.
Sometimes we went out among the hills around us to stalk gooral, an active little wild goat. Clambering up the almost sheer sides of the mountains or clinging to the faces of rugged precipices while carrying a heavy rifle was a toilsome task; and too often, after a long and perilous climb, did I arrive in sight of the quarry only to see it disappear in bounding flight over the cliffs.
In our excursions into the forest or by purchase from natives we gradually gathered together a varied collection of pets to solace our loneliness. At different times I possessed half a dozen barking deer fawns, one of which became an institution in Buxa. Scorning confinement she insisted on being allowed to wander loose about the Station, and, soon getting to know the sepoys' meal hours, visited the fort regularly. She was punctual in her attendance at tea-time in my bungalow, being exceedingly fond of buttered toast, and always claiming her share of mine. More than once I have only just been in time to save her from the rifle of one of our rare visitors who, seeing her on the hill-side, took her to be wild. A small green parrot which I had similarly objected to being shut up and flew freely about the Station. From wherever it happened to be its quick eye always marked my servant bringing my afternoon meal to the bungalow from the kitchen; and, having a strange liking for hot tea, it used to fly in through the open door of my sitting-room and perch on my head. It was little use my objecting to this familiarity; for, if I attempted to dislodge it, it would stick its claws into my scalp and hold on to my ear by its sharp beak until I let it drink from my cup. Its propensity for swooping down in the open on any white man was sometimes alarming to strangers. Once a certain civil official visitor to Buxa who was jocularly reputed to be overfond of alcohol and never far from the verge of delirium tremens was approaching my bungalow when the parrot swept down on him and tried to alight on his hat. Uncertain as to the reality of the vision circling around his head, our visitor uttered a cry of terror and tried to brush the phantom aside until I laughingly assured him that it was a real bird. He revenged himself afterwards by encouraging the parrot in a depraved taste for whisky.
A KNEELING ELEPHANT.
In my afternoon walks I used to be accompanied by a small menagerie. Two small barking deer stepped daintily behind me, their long ears twitching incessantly. A monkey loped on all fours ahead, now and then stopping to sit down and scratch himself thoughtfully. A bear cub shambled along, playing with my dogs and being occasionally rolled over by a combined rush of riotous puppies. On our return to the bungalow we would be greeted by no less than five cats; while from its perch on the veranda a young hornbill, scarcely feathered and possessing a beak almost as big as its body, would survey us with a cold and glassy stare from its unwinking eyes. Once in a beat in the forest my orderly caught a sambhur fawn which he bore, shrieking piteously, in his arms to me. In a day or two it was perfectly tame, fed from my hand, and insisted on sleeping on my bed. It was killed by a snake shortly afterwards.