292 THE HIGHLANDS OF CENTEAL ^DIA. 



hundred and fifty or five hundred pounds, but this 

 beef-fed monster must have touched seven hundred 

 pounds at least ; and a tiger, from his length and 

 suppleness, is a very awkward object to lift off the 

 o^round. 



I have said that ten feet one inch is the length of an 

 unusually large tiger. The average length from nose to 

 tip of tail is only nine feet six inches for a full-grown 

 male, and for a tigress about eight feet four inches. 

 The experience of all sportsmen I have met with, whose 

 accuracy I can rely on, is the same ; and it will 

 certainly be found, when much greater measurements 

 than this are recorded, that they have either been taken 

 from stretched skins or else in a very careless fashion. 

 The skin of a ten-feet tiger will easily stretch to thirteen 

 or fourteen feet, if required ; and if natives are allowed 

 to use the tape they are certain to throw in a foot or 

 two " to please master." Master also, no doubt, 

 sometimes pleases himself in a similar manner. A 

 well - known sportsman and writer, whose recorded 

 measurements have done more to extend the size of 

 the tiger than anything else, informed me himself that 

 all his measurements were taken from flat skins. But 

 the British public demands twelve-feet tigers, just as it 

 refuses to accept an Indian landscape without palm-trees. 

 So a siqjpressio veri went forth ; and not only that, but 

 his picture of a dead tiger being carried into camp was 

 improved by a few feet being added to the length of the 

 beast, while, to make room for it, the most of the 

 bearers were wiped out, leaving about four men only to 

 carry a tiger at least fifteen feet long ! 



Sporting stories are apt to breed each other, incident 

 leading on to incident, so that I find I have already 

 killed some five or six tigers while yet only on the 



