i8o RIFLE AND ROMANCE 



raising them again, while several false alarms and partial 

 stampedes occurred. The final scene came certainly before 

 all could possibly have quenched their thirst ; and this time 

 a frantic, helter-skelter retreat, accompanied by a chorus 

 of barks and whistles, scattered the herd for good. 



Their alarm was no ill-founded one, for a family of three 

 tigers prowled this river-bed, and one had passed this very 

 pool during the preceding night ; while tigers' pugs were 

 thickly imprinted in the moist sand, and the whitening 

 bones of many a chital lay in the grass around. 



The coverts in those small detached bandis^ like that of 

 Pipalda, are so few and so simple to work, and an animal is 

 so easily located by an examination of the one or two rare 

 pools still left in the parched jungle, that tigers were 

 usually bagged there without much difficulty. Sometimes 

 it would be one's fortune to come across a tiger and shoot 

 him practically single-handed, without the aid of an army 

 of beaters; or the beast might be found on or near his 

 " kill " by the energetic sportsman who had taken the 

 trouble personally to visit his baits in the very early 

 morning. 



Such bits of sport when they come are very welcome, 

 and there is a freshness about them that is often absent 

 from the stereotyped tiger-beat. 



On this particular morning, it will be remembered, we 

 had left the herd of spotted deer near Pipalda, and con- 

 tinued our ramble to examine the buffalo-calves tied out 

 overnight. 



And so we pass on downstream, towards the spot where 

 our first htta was left yesterday evening to await his fate. 

 Round that corner, and under that banyan tree, was it 

 not ? Yes. There he is, regarding us in the distance with 

 a bubaline stare. The poor little beast emits a little grunt- 

 ing squeak of welcome as he sees us approaching. The 

 pile of fodder placed at his disposal last night has nearly 

 disappeared, so he has not lacked occupation. One of the 



