A steep gully divided us from a rough ridge, upon a grassy ledge of which, about 200 yards off, a big black beast was grubbing and rooting about.

The shikari, shaking with excitement, handed me the rifle, urging me to shoot.  I did nothing of the sort, having no breath, and my hand being unsteady from a fast and stiff climb.

I regret to be obliged to admit that, not realising that it would be little short of miraculous to kill a bear stone-dead at 200 yards with a Mannlicher, and being also, naturally, somewhat carried away by the sight of a real bear within possible distance, I waited until I was perfectly steady, and fired.  The brute fell over, but immediately picked himself up again and made off.  I saw I had broken his fore-shoulder and fired again as he disappeared over the far side of the ledge, but missed, and I saw that bear no more.

We had the utmost difficulty in crossing the precipitous gully to a spot below the ledge upon which the beast had been feeding—­the ledge itself we could not reach at all; and the lateness of the hour and the difficulty of the country in which we were, prevented us from trying to enter the next ravine and work up and back by the way the bear had gone.  A neck-breaking crawl down a horrible grass slope brought us to better ground, and I sadly joined Jane to be well and deservedly scolded for firing a foolish shot.  The lady was very much disgusted at having been defrauded of the sight of a bear “quite wild,” as she expressed it—­a certain short-tempered animal which had eaten up her best umbrella in the Zoo at Dusseldorf not having fulfilled the necessary condition of wildness.

Next day I sent out coolies to search for traces, promising lavish “backshish” in the event of success, but I got no trustworthy news, “and that was the end of that hunting.”

May 6.—­Jane took a respite from the chase, and I sallied forth alone at dawn up a nullah from Alsu to look for a bear which was said to frequent those parts.  A brisk walk of some four miles over the flat, followed by a climb up a track—­steep as usual—­to the left of the main track to the Lolab, brought us to a grassy ridge, where I sat down patiently to await the bear’s pleasure.  I took my note-book with me, and whiled away some time in writing the following:—­

Let me jot down a sketch of my present position and surroundings; it will serve to bring the scene back to me, perhaps, when I am again sitting in my own particular armchair watching the fat thrushes hopping about the lawn.

Well, I am perched in a little hollow under a big grey boulder, which serves to shelter me to a certain, but limited, extent from the brisk showers that come sweeping over from the Lolab Valley.  The hollow is so small that it barely contains my tiffin basket, rifle, gun, and self—­in fact, my grass-shod and puttied extremities dangle over the rim, whence a steep slope shelves down some 200 feet to a brawling burn, the hum of which, mingling with the fitful sighing of the pines as the breeze sweeps through their sounding boughs, is perpetually in my ears.  Across the little torrent, and not more than a hundred yards away, rises a slope, covered with rough grass and scrub, similar to that in the face of which I am ensconced.