Page:Ancient India as described by Megasthenês and Arrian.djvu/79

 60 natured towards them, though they say that with its congeners it is rather quarrelsome. The males are reported to have a natural propensity not only to fight among themselves, by butting with their horns, but to display a like animosity against the female, and to be so obstinate in their quarrels that they will not desist till a worsted rival is killed outright. But, again, not only is every member of the body of this animal endued with great strength, but such is the potency of its horn that nothing can withstand it. It loves to feed in secluded pastures, and wanders about alone, but at the rutting season it seeks the society of the female, and is then gentle towards her, — nay, the two even feed in company. The season being over and the female pregnant, the Indi&n Kartazdn again becomes ferocious and seeks solitude. The foals, it is said, are taken when quite young to the king of the P r a s i i, and are set to fight each other at the great public spec- tacles. No full-grown specimen is remembered to have ever been caught. (21.) The traveller who crosses the mountains which skirt that frontier of India which is most inland meets, they say, with ravines which are clothed with very dense jungle, in a district called by the Indians K o r o u d a.1f These ravines are said to be the haunts of a peculiar kind of animal shaped lil^e a satyr, covered all over with shaggy hair, and having a tail like a horse's, depending from its rump. If these creatures are left un- molested, they keep within the coppices, living on the wild fruits ; but should they hear the hunter's T V. L. KoKovvba,