MAN-EATING TIGRESS OF MUNDAET. 257 



purely anthropophagous, although she no doubt preferred the flavour 

 of the better nourished flesh of mau. She often apparently disap- 

 peared for weeks and months at a time when she chanced to get in 

 amongst a sufficiency of game. When this supply ran short, she would 

 suddenly appear and attack men with increased persistence, killing 

 several within a few days. As she grew older, her taste for human 

 flesh increased, and her fear of man proportionately diminished. 



" If near a herd of cattle, she took no notice of the cattle, but went 

 straight for the herdsmen. On one occasion, in June 1883, she walked 

 at night into an out-office of the Lokhar rest-house, where some men 

 were sleeping at the further end, a cow and her calf being tied up in 

 the door-way. She passed these animals without taking any notice 

 of them, and carried off one of the caen. 



" Mention of this last-mentioned event leads us to a necessary digres- 

 sion in order to recall to the reader's mind the hio-hlv imaginative 

 account of the same, which appeared in June last in the Civil and Mili- 

 tary Gazette, Lahore, and was subsequently reprinted by almost every 

 newspaper in India, and even those in England. The wag who wrote 

 that article put into his picture a bright moon, the invariable cubs, 

 and the usual play with her victim which the fond mother goes in for in 

 order to teach her offspring how to kill. The picture was still further 

 embellished by several human figures perched up in surrounding 

 trees, watching this spectacle of horror. What actually took place 

 was simply this: — The movements of the affrighted cow and calf, and 

 no doubt also the noise made by the tigress as she darted off with 

 her victim, woke the other men, who began to interrogate one another 

 as to the cause of the commotion. Some of them even went to 

 the door to investigate. Everything was, however, still now, and the 

 men rolled themselves up again in their bedding, not recognising in 

 the dark that one of their number was missing. What happened in 

 the meantime outside was that the tigress, alarmed by the sudden 

 exclamations of the awkened sleepers, dropped her man and made off 

 to one side. When all was quiet again, she came back and picked up 

 the unfortunate man, who just then became conscious and groaned 

 aloud with pain. Realizing at last the position of affairs, the men inside 

 the room rushed out with loud cries only to see, in thedimlioht from 

 the clouded sky, the tigress disappear with their comrade down the 

 slope on to the road below. Mr. G.P. Chill, from whom we had the 

 preceding details a few days after their occurrence, and who was 

 sleeping in the rest-house, came out with his rifle on hearing the cries 



