48 BIRD LIFE GLIMPSES 



anything to do with the colouring of such an animal 

 as, say, the tiger, till recently much more the op- 

 pressor than the oppressed, and, even now, as much 

 the one as the other — in India, for instance, or Corea, 

 in which latter country things are certainly equal, if 

 we go by the Chinese proverb, which says, *' Half 

 the year the Coreans hunt the tigers, and the other 

 half the tigers hunt the Coreans." 



Tigers, indeed — especially those that are cattle- 

 feeders — would seem, often, to kill their prey towards 

 evening, but when it is still broad daylight. With 

 regard, however, to the way in which they accom- 

 plish this, I read some years ago, in an Indian sport- 

 ing work, a most interesting account of a tiger 

 stalking a cow — an account full of suggestiveness, 

 and which ought to have, at once, attracted the 

 attention of naturalists, but which, as far as I know, 

 has never since been referred to. The author — 

 whose name, with that of his work, I cannot recall 

 — says that he saw a cow staring intently at some- 

 thing which was approaching it, and that this some- 

 thing presented so odd an appearance that it was 

 some time before he could make out what it was. 

 At last, however, he saw it to be a tiger, or, 

 rather, the head of one, for the creature's whole 

 body, being pressed to the ground, with the fur 

 flattened down, so as to make it as small as possible, 

 was hidden, or almost hidden, behind the head, 

 which was raised, and projected forward very con- 

 spicuously ; so that, being held at about the angle 

 at which the human face is, it looked like a large, 

 painted mask, advancing along the ground in a very 

 mysterious manner. At this mask the cow gazed 



