Major F---- and I went with them in their car; while the Sikh officers followed in another. We sped rapidly through the park and out along rough country roads, by thatched cottages and grass huts, groves of mango trees and dense thickets of bamboo. By the village wells dark-eyed women, poising their water jars on their heads turned to stare at us as we passed in a cloud of dust. From the hamlets tiny naked children rushed out to gaze at the _shaitan ki gharri_--the "devil's car." We soon reached the spot where the elephants were waiting for us beside the road. On the backs of the splendid tuskers intended for the shooters were howdahs fitted with gun rests and seats. Our elephants knelt down for us to clamber up. The Maharajah, with the true spirit of hospitality, left the sport to his guests and went off to take charge of the line of beaters. Princess Sudhira, armed with a camera, shared his howdah. The shooting elephants moved across the fields to a _nullah_ filled with small trees and scrub jungle, in which the panther was reported to be hiding, and took up places in or on either bank of it. The beaters made a long circuit and formed line across the _nullah_. Then at a signal from the Maharajah they advanced towards us. As the ground on either side consisted of open, ploughed fields devoid of cover the panther would be forced to come along the ravine to the guns. The loud cries of the _mahouts_, the trumpeting of the elephants, the crashing of trampled jungle and the rending of boughs torn from the trees made a pandemonium of noise. I was posted high up on a bank and had a good general view of the scene. One of the Sikh nobles suddenly raised his rifle and fired; and I saw the lithe form of the panther for a few seconds as it dashed past his elephant and bounded like a great cat along the _nullah_. I caught an occasional glimpse of it between the patches of jungle but could not succeed in getting a shot. The Sikh's bullet had wounded it; but for the time it had succeeded in making its escape.