60 INDIAN BIG GAME chap. 



could see the tiger eating, but there were so many 

 intervening twigs that I feared the bullet would 

 be deflected ; so we made a final bound for a tree 

 near the edge. I was leading, and just missed 

 treading on a tigress lying down. She got up 

 with a roar and went up hill, giving me a quick 

 tail shot, which I would not take. The tiger, 

 hearing the roar, followed fast in the same line, 

 but exposed his right side diagonally. He was 

 also straight above us and some thirty yards 

 away. I did not fire : I wish I had. I did not 

 then know the power of the -470. 



That was the end of that affair. I was vexed, 

 but was glad that my wife had had so good a view. 



After that we reconnoitred all tie-up ground, 

 and cut paths to allow of noiseless approach. 



Only one place admitted of a beat. This was 

 a nullah that rose in the high ground above the 

 ghat valley, and ran down into the main stream 

 that watered the plateau. There was beautiful 

 green bush and tree cover with running water, 

 and tiger would sometimes lie up here. Every- 

 where else they preferred to hop over into the 

 big ghat valley. 



We got a kill in this nullah, and beat, but I do 

 not think the tiger was ever in the beat. This 

 was bad work. 



I let the men make a machan like a crow's 

 nest among the bare branches of a big huldoo tree, 

 which had good leaves on its top, and sat up. 

 The big electric - light batteries had run down, 

 and during all this shoot I had to sit near the 

 kill, and use the ordinary flashlight torch. More- 

 over, my tree was on one slope of the nullah and 



