Portland, W.J.A.C.J. Cavendish-Bentinck, 6th Duke of, 1937. Men, women and things: memories of the Duke of Portland. London, Faber & Faber.
[228] The two best game shots I ever met were undoubtedly, in my opinion, the late Lord Ripon, formerly Lord de Grey, and Sir Harry Stonor, both wonderfully good with either gun or rifle. - He was very often my guest at Welbeck for partridge and pheasant shooting. I append a list he gave me of the game he killed between 1867 and 1900. List includes 2 rhinoceros. The rhinoceroses mentioned at the head of the list must be those I saw him kill dead, right and left, with a four-bore rifle, from the back of an elephant in Nepal.
Nepal, 1882-83. (Note that Portland doesn’t give a date.) [256] Having heard a great deal about his visit to India from my brother-officer in the Coldstream, Jacko Durham, who had spent the previous winter there, and being deeply interested in our Eastern Empire because my great uncle Lord William Bentinck had been Governor of Madras (1803- 1807), and afterwards (1827-1835) a very distinguished Governor-General of India under John Company, I deter- mined to go there myself. Most fortunately it turned out that Lord de Grey, the eldest son of Lord Ripon, the then Viceroy, Lord Charles Beresford, Lord Wenlock, and Lord de Grey’s friend Wilfred Greenwood were going there. Lord de Grey most kindly invited me to join this little party. [257] We travelled a long way by train, and were then driven by young tea-planters in tandem dog-carts to the borders of Nepal, where we were met by the Nepalese elephants, on which we rode to a vast camp on the Rapti River. There we found the Maharajah of Nepal, Sir Runudeep Singh, ready to receive us. He of course had his own camp, and another, most luxurious camp was provided for us. There were no less than 700 elephants. - With the Maharajah was Mr. Girdlestone, the British Resident at Katmandu. He had a dear little pet-dog, which was allowed to lick the blood of the dead tigers. Tiger’s blood is supposed to give courage and ferocity; but, so far as I could see, it had no more effect upon him than the blood of a rabbit!
[258] The rhinoceros hunting was more interesting and to my mind much more sportsmanlike. We used fewer elephants than when we were after tiger, marching along in a line through the dense jungle ; and when the rhinoceros was found the fun began. Of our seven hundred elephants there were only two which were really staunch — that is, which would not run away if the rhinoceros charged, as it usually did; and we took it in turns to ride them. The rhino I killed charged my elephant, and I was lucky enough to kill it with one shot from my four-bore rifle. When it was lying dead on the ground I noticed something struggling behind it, and found that it was a baby rhino. Charlie Beresford and I tried to catch it alive ; but it was much too strong for us, and our friends shouted to us to get back on to our elephants as there were two more rhinos close by, which had been attracted by the squeals of the young one. Knowing that the baby would die without its mother, we shot it. Another time a rhino charged the line of elephants, rushed through our adjacent camp, knocked down one of the tents and escaped through the river. - We spent six very happy and interesting weeks in Nepal, where I believe that, besides other game, our bag was fourteen tigers and eight rhinoceros.
Plate on page following p.258. “Mama and baby.” Showing on top the trophy head of the female rhinoceros. Below the stuffed young rhino on a sockel. Both items probably on display in Welbeck Abbey, where Portland lived. – No later information found.
Plate. PART OF THE BAG
Durbungah
Standing, left to right: Ailwyn Fellowes, Mr. Shillingford, Lord Yareborough, and extreme right, Sir Henry Meysey-Thompson and Wilfred Greenwood. Seated, left to right: Lord Wenlock, Portland, Maharajah of Durbungah, Lord de Grey, Colonel Money
Plate of Mama and Baby
