IQO CARNIVORA. 



he recovered consciousness the courageous ruminant had hurled him 

 repeatedly in the air. According to the Tungusians the bear and tiger 

 often fight, and then the latter usually comes off second best. In Hin- 

 dostan, where many sects of natives reverence the tiger as an incarnation 

 of the destructive powers of Nature, the roads would be impassable in 

 many regions unless for the creature's extraordinary dread of fire ; yet 

 hunger drives it to contemn even fire, and an English officer was carried 

 off by one when he was sitting with his companions by the camp-fire. 

 The sentries of troops in the field are often victims. Forbes knew of 

 three well-armed soldiers killed in one night. At the great fair of Hurd- 

 war, where hundreds of thousands of natives assemble, a tiger sprang 

 into the crowd from a thicket and struck a native who was peacefully 

 preparing- curry. Another sprang upon an elephant, tore the English 

 sportsman out of the howdah, and plunged with him into the jungle; the 

 man had been rendered senseless by the fall and shock, but was revived 

 by the scratches he received from thorns as the brute carried him away ; 

 with great presence of mind he remembered he had a brace of pistols ; 

 he drew one, but it missed fire, and the tiger only bit the deeper. A 

 second shot just behind the shoulder-blade was lucky enough to reach 

 the heart ; the officer recovered, but was lame for life. The postal ser- 

 vice in India is rendered very dangerous by the attacks of these Car- 

 nivora ; at one ford across the Goomea in Guzerat a letter-carrier was 

 carried off every day for fourteen days, and at Cutcam Sands a tigress 

 stopped all postal communication for several months. But the island of 

 Singapore seems the spot where men are most frequently attacked. 

 Wallace states that there are always tigers near the town, and they kill 

 a Chinaman every day. Another traveler puts the number of Chinese 

 killed annually at four hundred. The Dutch government returned the 

 loss of life by tigers in Java in 1862 at three hundred. 



It is a remarkable fact that the tiger is quite a new arrival in Singa- 

 pore. During the early years of its occupation the beast was never 

 heard of; at present, in spite of all the efforts of the English government, 

 they increase instead of diminishing. New immigrants come from the 

 mainland, and in doing so have to swim a strait fully an English mile 

 wide. The tiger is an admirable swimmer, and never hesitates to pursue 

 its prey in water. A sportsman on Saugor Island came upon a tiger and 

 immediately fled into the river ; the tiger followed, and gained rapidly 

 till the man dived and swam some distance under water. When he 



