THE TIGER. 159 
most familiar instance of astuteness among brutes,—each Tiger seems to have its peculiar 
individuality so strongly marked, that it must be separately matched by the hunter's skill. 
Of the ordinary Tiger-hunt, or rather Tiger-mobbing, with its posse comitatus of 
elephants, horses, dogs, and men, no description will be given, as the subject has been 
rendered so familiar by many illustrated publications which have issued from the press 
in late years; and the space which would be required for a detailed narration of such 
scenes may be better employed in describing those portions of the Tiger's charagter which 
are not so popularly known. 
When the Tiger strikes down and kills a large animal, such as an ox, he tears open 
the throat of his’ prey, and eagerly laps the blood as it streams hotly from the wound. 
Having solaced his appetite by this preliminary indulgence, he drags it to some place of 
concealment, where he watches over it until the evening, and makes up his mind for a 
prolonged banquet. Beginning at the hinder quarters, he eats his way gradually towards 
the head, occasionally moistening his sanguine feast by a draught of water from a 
neighbouring stream, but never ceasing from his gluttonous repast until he has so entirely 
gorged himself that he is incapable of taking another mouthful. He is in no way choice 
of palate, but eats everything as it comes, even to the skin and the very bones themselves. 
He now yields himself to sleep, and for three days hes in a semi-torpid state, never 
moving except to drink, and calmly enjoying the double happiness of a powerful 
appetite and a good digestion. After the three days have passed, he is ready for another 
feast, and returning to his prey, again gorges himself on the remains, caring little whether 
the taint of corruption has come upon them, and only desirous to assimilate as much 
animal matter as possible in a limited time. 
Knowing the habits of the Tiger, the herdsman who has suffered the loss of one of 
his oxen takes his revenge by watching the marauder to his lair, waiting until the 
repleted animal has retired either to drink, or for his long sleep. He then rubs some 
arsenic into a few gashes which he cuts upon the hinder quarters of the stolen ox, and 
leaves the poison to do its work. In due time the Tiger returns to his prey, tears off and 
swallows the deadly food, and on feeling the burning agony caused by this most irritant 
of poisons, runs to the water-side, where he endeavours in vain, by repeated draughts 
of the cool stream, to quench the fire that consumes him. But a few hours now elapse 
before he lies dead by the water-side. 
It would have been well for one cattle proprietor if he had adopted this safe expedient 
of destroying the animal that had robbed him. 
Preferring the excitement of shooting the Tiger, he lay in wait for the beast as it 
returned to the dead ox for its second banquet, and fired at the marander with uncertain 
aim, only frightening instead of destroying it. The Tiger was so alarmed at the report 
of the gun, that it would not run the risk of a similar danger, and yet was so fond of 
beef, that it could not refrain from attacking the herds. So it compromised the matter 
by making only a single meal on every ox which it killed, and was so fearful of exposing 
itself to peril, that it would only drink the blood of the slaughtered ox, and never return 
to it a second time. The consequence of this manceuvre was, that the Tiger used to kill 
two or three oxen at a time, merely for the purpose of drinking their blood. 
The destruction of the Indian Tiger might be more complete were not the animal 
protected in various ways. - 
Religious principles: take the chief ground, and, as is generally the case in India, choose 
the wrong side of the question. Many sects of that strange, polytheistic mythology, 
deem the Tiger to be a sacred animal, simply because it is so destructive and so dangerous, 
and will not agus it to be killed unless it is one of the “man-eaters,”—whose propensities 
have already been mentioned. 
Private predilections take second rank in this matter, and cause many a Tiger to roam 
unmolested, to the destruction of human and animal life, whose career might easily have 
been arrested, did not the will of an imperious ruler decree that the destructive animal 
should be at liberty to depopulate the country until such time as it pleased the self-willed 
autocrat to amuse a heavy hour by giving chase to the animal. 
There are, in fact, some native chiefs—and, until later days, there were many more of 
