60 LLOYD’S NATURAL HISTORY. 
a 
vegetation, scarce a day passed without one or more Cows 
falling victims. The western side of the flat had long been 
abandoned as a grazing-ground, for the coal-mine hill was not 
only covered with thick second growth but honeycombed with 
limestone caves and coal-galleries, in which the marauders 
established their quarters ; and so many at one time occupied 
these refuges that the coal-carriers had to go for their require- 
ments in a body, while, when coal was needed for the mess or 
officers’ bungalows, a guard had to be sent with the coolies. 
Not that the animals were aggressive in the oper, but in the 
dark recesses of the coal-tunnels, they were apt to resent in- 
trusion, being run into a cul de sac. In addition to the cover 
named, there were several spots within the station, such as rifts 
in the sandstone and under slabs, where the brutes could skulk 
the whole day long, issuing forth in the gloaming to intercept 
the cattle wending their way home for the night. A Tiger had, 
indeed, every advantage in Cherra; he fought shy of the traps 
erected for his special behoof, and, as no trees can be induced 
to grow on this storm-swept, rock-strewn heath, and machans 
would be too conspicuous unless you could manage a potshot 
from the houses, it was difficult to bag one. In the dead ot 
the night people took the yelling of saises from the well-secured 
stables, as matters of course; and though the roofs of all 
houses were pitched low on account of the wind, the poaching 
Tigers were instinctively chary of exposing themselves against 
the skyline on the ridges ; while, owing to the almost incessant 
rain, clear moonlight nights were the exception ; and though 
few houses were without a trophy in the shape of a hearthrug 
or two from the hide of the beasts, nearly the whole of these 
had either been trapped or shot by sheer luck from the bed- 
room windows or glass-enclosed verandas. 
“Many tales have been told of these chance shots, and, 
though well authenticated, would, to those who had never 
