CHAPTER XXX 



ONCE more alone for I had parted with my companions 

 some days before I was continuing my lonely tour, so 

 pleasantly interrupted, when one morning on my way to 

 inquire about a man-eater (tiger) said to have decimated a 

 village near my camp, I came unexpectedly upon another 

 white man, evidently as lonely as myself, riding a Bengal 

 " tat." * 



He proved to be an Austrian Roman Catholic missionary 

 priest, living practically as a native in the very village I 

 was bound for, and from the conversation I had with him 

 which, by the way, was conducted in Bengali, being the 

 only language mutually understood I ascertained that the 

 story of the man-eater had, as usual, been much exag- 

 gerated, two people only having been killed by the beast, 

 which, moreover, had not been seen or heard of for some 

 weeks. 



The priest dined with me that night, and though we 

 conversed in Bengali as before my knowledge of German 

 being limited to " Ja " and " Nein," and his of English 

 equally restricted I could see that he was a man of 

 birth and breeding. He told me some details of his present 

 life, and how he lived in an ordinary native hut, which was 

 also the church, without servants, punkahs, or ice, or 

 even bread. 



In these circumstances I was not surprised to see him 

 enjoying his dinner as much, if not more than my com- 

 panionship, and afterwards, when I gave him a cigar, it 

 was so distressing to me to see the pleasure he derived 

 from it, that I presented him with the box. He declined 

 my offer of a shake-down for the night, but the next 

 morning, as I was starting for my next encamp- 

 ment, he appeared, riding the same pony a miserable 



* Small pony. 

 230 



