222 A NATURALIST'S WANDERINGS 



to realise the gigantic proportions of their prostrate trunks 

 till I began to move about and travel along them. A human 

 figure was lost among them. Standing by these trunks, my 

 head often did not reach much more than to half the height 

 of some of them, while their length of bare stem measured as 

 much as forty or fifty yards before giving off a branch. 



One afternoon, as I was returning from this forest with my 

 men who had been felling trees, walking in line one behind 

 the other as is their custom, a tiger suddenly slipped from the 

 jungle bordering the road, and in a moment struck down a 

 youth a few yards before me. I dared not fire for fear of 

 striking the youth, but his father, who was walking just in 

 front of him armed with a spear, dashed on it and gave it 

 a right willing thrust, which, with the threatening group, made 

 it quit its hold, when it sprang into the thick jungle. It was 

 all the work of a moment ; the stroke of its paw did not seem 

 to be tremendous, but the claws of the brute had penetrated 

 so deeply into the chest and shoulder of the youth that he 

 survived scarcely a quarter of an hour after being carried into 

 the village- Early next morning I was aroused by a great 

 commotion, a loud screaming and scampering of feet, amid 

 which I heard the word " Matjan " (tiger). Jumping up, I 

 slid a cartridge into my Martini-Henry, and rushed out, to 

 find every man brandishing a long spear in the one hand and 

 a kriss in the other, all looking very scared. The tiger of the 

 previous day had come after his unburied quarry, as they 

 firmly believed and asserted against my doubts that he would, 

 and had actually ventured into the middle of the village, and 

 within thirty feet of my door which stood next to the house 

 containing the dead body. The clamour had frightened it 

 off into the impenetrable jungle which closely hedged round 

 the village, whither I could follow it only a very short way. 



As we re-entered the village the body of the youth was 

 being brought out for burial amid terrible wailings of the 

 women. It was sewed into a thick grass mat, on the top of 

 which were spread flowers of the cocoa and pinang palms, and 

 over which, as it was borne away, handfuls of yellowed rice were 

 thrown. The villagers fell in behind the body, each man 

 with a spear over his shoulder, their tips glittering in the 

 sun like a regiment of bayonets, for fear of another sudden 



