TIGERLAND 



For two long afternoons till dusk, I had sat in solemn 

 silence, expecting every moment to see the beasts emerge 

 from the forest into the strip of open I commanded, though 

 as well might I have expected to see a hippopotamus 

 come out and dance a hornpipe ; but on the third evening 

 a couple of hours before sunset just as I had made up 

 my mind to another disappointment, I heard a loud 

 crashing in the jungle as of some large animals coming 

 towards me. 



At last ! thought I, my efforts are about to be re- 

 warded, and with every nerve in my body tingling with 

 excitement, I brought the hammers of my rifle noiselessly 

 to full cock, and with my eyes riveted on the jungle, waited 

 further developments. A moment or two later the head 

 of an animal appeared through the tangled brushwood 

 then another and another, till some twenty large beasts 

 had emerged into the open. 



But with the first that had showed itself completely, 

 my interest in them had ceased, for I had recognized the 

 hideous misshapen head and long, low, ugly body of the 

 domesticated buffalo a herd of these half-tamed creatures 

 had apparently been wandering about the jungle all the 

 day, as is their habit, and now that night was approaching 

 were slowly wending their way homewards to the village 

 they belonged to, as they generally do at nightfall. 



I watched them lumbering down the glade with feelings 

 not very difficult to imagine, and muttered observations 

 not very flattering to their species, and was about to fire 

 off my rifle the signal for my elephant to fetch me 

 when my attention was attracted to two round, curious- 

 looking objects, close together, but half concealed within 

 the jungle some hundred yards ahead of the retreating 

 buffalo. Putting up my glasses, I found to my amaze- 

 ment that they were the heads belonging to a brace of 

 tigers, which, from their eyes being fixed upon the buffalo, 

 were evidently contemplating an attack on them while 

 the latter were seemingly quite unconscious of their 

 presence. 



But to understand what followed, it is necessary to 

 describe the formation of the jungle and its position with 

 reference to the glade, or opening, already mentioned. 

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