22 RIFLE AND ROMANCE 



jungle-man no doubt anxiously urging on his belated 

 bullocks as they return to their forest village. Then a 

 last far-off yell, as the cart is evidently forced up the 

 steep bank. 



A couple of years or thereabouts had passed by, 

 during which time the tigress and her cubs had roamed 

 the jungles together, the same inseparable trio ; she 

 teaching them their trade by practical demonstration, 

 watching them as they practised on the smaller creatures 

 on which they preyed, killing the larger animals.for them 

 when necessary, driving off any possible enemies by 

 terrifying demonstrations, and generally bringing up her 

 family in the way that every right-minded tiger should 

 go. The cubs learned discretion when mother avoided 

 the sneering patriarchal wild boar ; or when the excitable 

 sloth bear, short-sighted and hard of hearing, was left 

 to grub in peace. That there was some other animal, 

 small, red, and many in number, of which they had 

 reason to entertain the alertest vigilance, the young tigers 

 were already aware, but mother had always hurried them 

 away so swiftly that these were not yet fully known to 

 them. 



Of man also, that mysterious being, they acquired the 

 necessary knowledge, giving him as wide a berth as the 

 jungle folk gave them ; although they were aware of their 

 own power under pressure of circumstances even in this 

 direction, having joined in a horrible uproar one morning, 

 when a party of woodcutters happened suddenly and by 

 chance on their retreat, and mother, springing forward to 

 display all those intimidating qualities with which Nature 

 had endowed her, chased them flying in panic before her 

 terrible voice. 



Thus season had succeeded season, and the hot weather 

 found the tigress, and her now nearly full-grown cubs, 



