THE BIOGRAPHY OF A TIGER 29 



but, as we watch and conjecture, there is at last a distant 

 twinkle through the spectral limbs of leafless trees, and a 

 bright star slowly rises and glitters on the eastern horizon. 

 We were right. It is the dawn. And that is Lucifer 

 morning star and light-bringer. 



The slumbering forest stirs gently. There is an in- 

 definable but unmistakable feeling in the freshening air, 

 the promise of day. Then somewhere far away the crow 

 of a jungle-cock rises clear. 



It is instantly answered by the loud mewing of peafowl 

 from every point of the surrounding woods, where the 

 great birds are perched roosting on the limbs of the 

 largest trees they can find 



" Mia-a-oo ! Ah-oo ! Aaow ! Ah-h-o-o ! Pah-h-oo ! " 



A faint twittering of bulbuls commences in the under- 

 growth ; and soon, in all directions, the jungle-cocks are 

 busily crowing. Spur-fowl, too, with their rapid " Kukur- 

 ruka wack ! Kukurruka wack ! " 



Now the faintest greenish suffusion is gradually mount- 

 ing into the sky, pushing the morning star ever higher 

 and paler. The jungle grows perceptibly clearer, and the 

 tips of withered grasses begin to stand out against a 

 shadowy background. 



To the watcher who has come through the long night 

 on his tree-perched platform, the soaring glowing fore- 

 runners of day bring cheerful but solemn thoughts. 



The pale and sickly moonlight of those wakeful hours 

 has been almost more unbearable than the short silence 

 of darkness that succeeded it; and as the shadows of 

 night go trailing away their long, crapy garments, man's 

 soul unconsciously responds to the splendid promise of 

 light and refreshed rejuvenated life now springing below 

 the eastern hills. 



Against the shining false-dawn a line of remotest hills 

 is drawn clear and vigorously sharp. The eye begins to 

 gather in a splendid sweep of view. But there is a. 



