essly entangled, like
Isaac's ram, to rise chuckling and flee away to another hiding-place.

Without dogs, he would be often extremely hard to find; but unluckily for
himself, being a true Kashmiri bird, he cannot help making a noise, and
thereby betraying his presence. His corpse, when dead, is hard to find in
the jungle, and a runner is, of course, hopeless without canine help. It
is well, therefore, to kill him as dead as possible, and to that end I
used No. 4 shot, with, I think, a certain advantage over Walter, who shot
with No. 6, and who, in consequence, lost several birds.

The friendliness and sociability of the beasts and birds of Kashmir has
been a great joy to us. The thing can be overdone, though, and both the
wasps and the rats of Harwan were inclined to overstep the bounds of
decorum.

The latter were obviously overjoyed to see visitors, and visions of
unlimited plunder from our festive board would, of course, put them
somewhat above themselves. Still, they should have refrained from rioting
so openly around our beds as soon as the lights were out, and Jane was
naturally indignant when a large one ran over her feet!

On Friday morning we left Harwan, pretty early, as usual, for it is still
somewhat too warm to travel comfortably in the middle of the day. The
Colonel (always an early bird) got away first, followed by our invalid in
his dandy, while Jane and I remained to hunt the loiterers out of camp. A
glorious morning, and the cheering knowledge that breakfast was in front
of us, sent us merrily along for a mile or two, until branching paths led
us to inquire of an intelligent Kashmiri, who appeared to be busily
engaged in reaping rice with a penknife, as to the road taken by our
precursors, especially the tiffin coolie!

The industrious one had seen no sahibs at all pass by. This was a blow,
and Jane and I sat down to review the situation. We finally decided that
the son of the soil was indulging in what the great and good Winston
Churchill has called a "terminological inexactitude," as the others must
have gone by one of the two roads; so, putting our fortunes to the touch,
we took the left-hand path, and were in due time rewarded by reaching
Sogul, and there finding our pioneers peacefully seated under a tree, and
breakfast ready.

Leaving Sogul, we skirted for some miles a bare ridge which rose on the
right, and which looked an ideal ground for chikor, and then turned into a
beautiful valley d