THE TIGER. 287 



probably have passed out at the top without seeinrr her, 

 as she was lying close under a shelving bank, but for 

 the profane language of an ancient gray-bearded 

 Haniiman, who posted himself right above her, and 

 swore away until he fairly turned her out of her com- 

 fortable berth. The excitement of the monkeys soon 

 told me she was on the move ; and presently I saw her 

 round face looking at me from behind a tree with 

 a forked trunk, throuG^h the cleft of which I cauo-ht 

 sight of about a square foot of her striped hide. It 

 seemed about the right place, so covering it carefallv 

 I put in a shell at about forty yards, and she collapsed 

 there and then, forming a beautiftd spread-eagle in 

 the bottom of the nala. The youngster now started out, 

 roaring as if he were the biggest tiger in the country ; 

 and, though I fired a couple of snap shots at him as he 

 galloped through some thick bushes, I could not stop 

 him. It is important to extinguish a brute, however 

 young, who has once tasted human flesh ; and I 

 followed him up till it grew nearly dark, when I 

 returned to the ravine to take home the tigress, and 

 there I found my monkey friends tucking into the 

 berries in all directions, and hopping about close to the 

 body of the dead tigress. The cub was met, much 

 exhausted with its run, by a gang of wood-cutters, and 

 killed with their axes. 



The barking of deer, and the alarmed cry of peafowl, 

 also frequently indicate the movements of a tiger. 

 The sambar, the spotted deer, the barking deer, and 

 the little four-horned antelope, all " bark " violently at 

 a tiger suddenly appearing in the daytime. Once 

 having marched nearly a thousand miles exploring in 

 the forests almost without firing a shot, I halted to hunt 



