HUNT THE "DON." 309 



The slaughter of the cattle had taken place on the 6th May; the 

 weather was not settled till the 8th ; and on the 9th, having made careful 

 arrangements in the interval, I commenced with the only five elephants I 

 happened to have and a hundred picked men. 



The trackers soon ascertained that the Don was lying in a cool green 

 cover on the river, just above an old stone dam which raised the water to a 

 sufficient level to be drawn off by the channel that fed the Bamasamoodrum 

 lake. Into this cover the tiger had dragged three carcasses, and had been 

 there since the 7 th. The only place I could find to command his line of 

 escape was a point on the opposite side of the river, where the bank was 

 some four or five feet high. His retreat would be across the river to that 

 side, and I commanded the bed for a hundred yards up and down; the 

 stream was about thirty yards wide, and the water some two feet deep. I 

 did not mount a tree, as I could see better on foot. 



After the lapse of a quarter of an hour the beat commenced. It was a 

 slow and quiet one, most of the men merely acting as stops outside, whilst 

 the trackers crept in till they found the half-eaten carcasses ; the Don was 

 lying near them, but retired from the men's intrusion, which information 

 they shouted to me. The cover was a narrow strip and the men worked 

 him along, following his pugs nearly to the end of it. I now saw him slip 

 noiselessly into the water under the shelter of an overhanging bush about 

 one hundred and twenty yards from me down stream. He stood for a moment, 

 his back almost level with the water, pricking his rounded ears and looking 

 wistfully at the opposite bank. I thought I might not see him again, and 

 fearing to lose even this opportunity I fired. We found afterwards that 

 this shot just grazed his back. He sprang up the bank with a growl, but 

 came face to face with an elephant, upon which he turned and sprang with 

 a short roar far out into the river, and in two or three bounds was up the 

 bank on my side. 



The cover which he had gained was a corresponding slip to the one he 

 had left, and ended at the stone dam some four hundred yards further down. 

 I now lost no time in running to the dam to try and head him, as his line 

 would be still down stream. I hoped I had succeeded in this ; but when the 

 beaters and elephants had crossed, and beat out the cover, we found he had 

 passed before I got there. We now feared he would travel far. The next 

 cover of importance was a mile away inland, in a ravine between which and 

 ourselves lay a difficult stretch of hard country covered with scrub-jungle, 

 where tracking would be no easy work. The day was hot, however, and we 

 knew the tiger was gorged, so we determined to keep to his track. Leaving 

 the elephants and beaters at the dam, the trackers and I started. 



