However, I took courage and went close and put my hand on the beast; what should it be but an immense boar lying dead in his lair.
He must have died months before I found him, as the skin fell to pieces on being touched, the hair into powder; his head was a splendid one, but I could only save the jawbones, in which were a grand pair of tusks.
The moral of this was that pigs, like everything else, die--sometimes quietly in their beds, be that retreat only a lair in the forest; but it is a rare occurrence to find relics of wild animals in so perfect a state.

I fancy their friends and relations generally eat them.

The bed or lair he was lying in was a most snug spot, and he would have been quite invisible had not some of the brushwood been burnt away, Arab fashion, a short time before I found him.
I must warn any sportsman intending to shoot in the Jihoon river that the wandering Arabs who are to be found there, though not brigands of a high order, are petty thieves to the last degree.

We were always obliged to keep a watch in our tents, leaving a man behind in charge when we went on shooting excursions.

On one occasion we found on our return that our watchman had captured an old woman whom he caught in the act of creeping under the tent and stealing a spoon.