The Antiquities of Orissa v2.c16.70

v2.c16.70

The fourth tableau repesents a royal hunt (A. 4). In the centre is a tree bearing large lotus-like flowers which from their eyes I should take to be sun flowers, (*pentapetes phoenicea*), though the tree in that case should have been smaller:—but for the eyes they could have passed for the *Hibiscus mutabilis*, which bears the name of the *sthalapadma* or "land lotus"; and from behind the tree a king, or a man of consequence, has just shot an arrow at a long-horned antelope bounding away from before him with the shaft sticking on (or a wing attached to?) its flank. The archer is richly clad, and has a sword by his side, and holds the bow in the true ancient Indian style, which is the same as the English, and draws the string up to his ears, and not to his breast as did the Assyrians and also the Macedonians of old. Behind him is his led-horse, richly caparisoned with a heavy pad, a many-strapped briddle, and a thickly-plumed crest, and followed by a retinue of servants holding an umbrella and *chowris*. The groom is a boy, ill-clothed and without ornaments. Under the antelope shot are three fawns, and before them stands a hunter holding his bow reversed, after having discharged his arrow at an antelope in advance of him, while a lady seated on a tree beholds the scene from above. The foliage and flowers of this tree are similar to those of the tree in the second compartment, and so it may be taken for a *Jonesia Aśoka*. Near the crest of the fourth arch is a weasel or other animal with a long bushy tail trailing on the ground. Being far beyond the range of the hunter's arrow, it finds itself secure enough to look leisurely at the scene on the fore-ground.