72 RIFLE AND ROMANCE 



bourhood for days at a time. In fact, he was a perfect 

 shaitdn ! 



" Now there are lots of tigers with more or less similar 

 habits ; but I had bagged several of the kind, and felt that, 

 given patience, time, and luck, I should assuredly remove 

 this one's skin to the security and comfort of my bungalow 

 or to that of the old place at home. And, as usual, I was 

 right ! " and, gently closing his eyes, the doctor complacently 

 blew an enormous cloud from his Mayo cheroot. 



" Well, I started trying for that tiger. 



" His special bit of jungle was a little level valley en- 

 circled by an amphitheatre of low rocky hills arid drained 

 by a winding ndla a beautiful ndla ; its bed of smooth, 

 clean, golden sand, overhung by charming trees and green 

 bushes, broken here and there by outcrops of sandstone 

 boulders, and holding, at the mouth of the little vale, 

 marked by the big tamarinds as the deserted village site 

 of Paldi, one solitary spring-fed pool of crystal clear water. 

 This snug retreat the brute had entirely to himself, for he 

 would permit no other felines to share it ; and the wood- 

 cutters of the villages in the vicinity, the only people who 

 ever went that way, never dared so much as to pass the 

 little gorge by the waterhole that led to his sylvan fastness. 



" I saw at once that ordinary methods would not prevail, 

 so, after a day or two spent in cautious reconnaissance of 

 the scene of future operations, I at length prevailed on 

 some of the inhabitants of the villages round about to lend 

 me the services of their cattle, thus possessing myself of a 

 ' scratch ' herd of bovines of decidedly mixed appearance, 

 mostly very scraggy. This motley assemblage I caused 

 to be driven, one evening about five o'clock, through the 

 dreaded pass and into the little strath I have already 

 described. 



" A forest fire had swept over a portion of the glade, and 

 the half-starved kine, their senses ravished by a sight of 

 the fresh green grass that sprouted from the blackened 



