Though Sir John had severed his official connection with Morocco, he retained his villa at Ravensrock. Thither, after an interval, he returned to spend the winters. During the first year of absence after his retirement, on learning of the serious illness of the companion of so many of his sporting days, Hadj Hamed, the chief of the boar-hunters, he writes to his daughter, enclosing a letter to be delivered by his little grandson to the dying man:—
Wiesbaden, March 31, 1887.
Your letter of the 23rd has just reached A. I cannot tell you how grieved I feel from the account you give of dear old Hadj Hamed, and I fear much I may never see his kind face again. As I thought it would please and cheer him if I wrote a few lines to him as an old friend, I have written in my bad Arabic the enclosed note, which dear Jock will perhaps deliver in person to him. It is merely to say I am so sorry to hear from you he is ill, that I pray God he will keep his health, and that we shall meet in October next and hunt together, and that I look upon him as a brother and a dear friend.
In 1887 he returned to winter at Tangier, and though a septuagenarian, was as keen a sportsman as ever. Writing in October he says:—
I have already bought a nag for myself, and, like myself, short and dumpy, but with legs that will not fail or stumble with twelve stone seven on his back, for if I fall I do not stot up as of old, but make a hole in the ground and stick there.
The winter of that year found him riding hard after pig on his little cob, and untiring in pursuit of game. He writes to his son-in-law an account of one of these hunts in which he had a narrow escape from injury:—
The hunt has been a successful one, and barring three wounded horses, one dog killed, a couple of spills, and ——— rather shaken, all’s well. Six or seven lances smashed—not by me, except one dumpy lance, of which anon.
A. went off early on Monday the 12th to put the camp in order. I followed her with mother. We lunched in the Ghaba Sebaita. At 3 p.m. I left her, so as to be early in camp to see that all was right. On reaching the head of the lake, I met a hunter who told me he had seen a very large boar come out of the cork-wood and lie down on the border of the lake. I sent a messenger for the hunters, who were returning, and awaited them on my ‘kida,’ sine lance. When they arrived they also were lanceless; but the Sheríf having come up with his lance, and Mahmud with him with another, I induced the Sheríf to make Mahmud dismount and give his lance to J. G. I took from a beater a short lance (five feet), and thus armed we entered the lake. W., with a lance, was seen in the distance and beckoned for; Colonel C., with his party, also arrived armed with a lance. J. G. started the boar, and away we went in six inches of water. As soon as J. G. approached, the boar turned and charged, smashing his lance. Spying his horse coming up in the distance, as it was being led to the camp, he galloped off and got the fresh horse and his own lance.
Colonel C. followed the boar with me, and as soon as he neared the beast, it turned and charged; but received a severe wound, the lance remaining in the boar. Then, as no sound lance remained, I presented myself. No sooner did the boar hear me in his wake than round he came, at a hundred miles an hour, upon my short lance, the point of which, being badly tempered and very blunt, bent to an angle of ninety degrees. My gallant little horse leapt over the pig, as he passed under his barrel. Up came J. G. with his fresh lance and gave it hard, but still the boar went on, in deeper and deeper water, making for Arára[67]. Some greyhounds of the Sheríf’s were slipped, and the gallant boar fought them all. The hunters came up, and the boar still moved towards Arára. I asked a Moor with a hatchet to knock the brave beast on the head, but he declined the task; and, as there was no second lance, the boar moved on towards Arára very slowly, fighting the dogs. Finding that neither prayers nor abuse were attended to by the hunters, I jumped off my nag into the water, knee deep, and taking the hatchet advanced on the pig. He charged when I got within five yards of him, and I broke the hatchet on his skull and retreated; the greyhounds laid hold behind, and the brave beast was done for. I got rated by J. G., who saw it, and by A. afterwards; but mother is to be kept in the dark about this ‘tomfoolery,’ as A. says. The fact is, there was no danger, for the greyhounds came to the rescue when the boar charged.
On another occasion, after a successful day’s pigsticking thirteen miles from Tangier, he and his younger daughter, riding home in the evening, saw two Bonelli eagles and six great bustards. The latter allowed them to approach within forty yards. ‘This,’ he writes, ‘was too much for my old sporting blood, so I invited J. G. to join me, and next day we went out to the site and viewed three ‘hobar’ (great bustards), and were after them twice, but could not get near for a shot. I shot a Bonelli eagle from my pony, who, even after a thirty miles’ ride yesterday, was very larky, but stood fire like an old war-horse.’