Page:Wanderings of a Pilgrim Vol 2.djvu/105

 down the right nostril by its weight; it was of silver, with four large beads, and an ornament of curious form. She had thick purple glass rings on her arms, called churees, of coarse manufacture, and other ornaments which I forget, something of the same sort.

She talked openly and freely. I took the man's bow, and shot an arrow after the English fashion; at which the whole family laughed excessively, and appeared to think it so absurd that I should not draw a bow in the style of a mountaineer. I begged the man to show me the proper method; he put a sort of ring on my thumb, placed my right forefinger straight along the arrow, and bid me draw it by the force of the string catching on the thumb-ring. I did so, and shot my arrow with better aim than when pursuing the English method. His happiness was great on my giving him a rupee for a bow, two arrows, one of which was the poisoned one, and the thumb-ring. He said his employment consisted principally in shooting animals at night by laying in wait for them. He crouched down on the ground to show the way of laying in wait for wild hogs. On seeing a hog near, he would immediately spring to his feet and shoot his arrow, drawing it quite to the head. Sometimes they kill hogs with poisoned arrows; nevertheless they feed upon the animals, taking care to cut out the flesh around the arrow the instant the hog falls. He told us he had but one wife, his tirī, the hill-man's name for wife, whom he had left at home; perhaps the tirī was an abbreviation of istirī, or tiriyā, wife.

After our long conversation with the savages we bade them adieu, and my parting present was a pink silk handkerchief for his tirī in the Hills. We returned at two to the boats, completely fagged, with the accompaniment of headaches from the heat of the sun: unmoored the vessels, and with a good breeze reached Rajmahal at dark. During our absence some hill-men came to the boats, and offered bows to the dāndees, begging in exchange a piece of linen. They parted with them afterwards for one halfpenny a piece. I must not omit to mention the magnificent wild climber, the Cachnár, Bauhinia scandens, which I gathered in the pass. The leaves are of immense size, heart