TIGER CUBS 113 



fastnesses, walks, drinking - places ; in fact, all the 

 habits of these two tigers in particular. My great 

 experience with tigers in general stood me in good 

 stead. (Hamilton says I have seen more of tigers and 

 their habits than perhaps any man of twenty years' 

 shooting now in Southern India more than himself.) 

 How bad my luck has been with them you may see, 

 but the ice is broken. The tigress, I found, was 

 extremely cunning ; her smaller footmark being found 

 only among the wildest crags in my hunting ground. 

 She evidently was a creature who slept with her eyes 

 open. Well, after a thorough investigation of all the 

 tiger paths crossing across nullahs, I chose what I con- 

 sidered the most generally used, and tied up the 

 buffalo close to it. About the fourth morning we 

 found her dead, but on examination found she had 

 died a natural death. It was better that it was so, as 

 tigers are great carrion-eaters, and the dreadful smell 

 would attract them. The next morning, as I cal- 

 culated, we found the round of beef eaten, and the 

 buffalo, who was tied with immense creepers, dragged 

 with her neck clean out of the socket Stealing 

 quietly into the tree, we sit quiet as mice in expecta- 

 tion of the tiger every moment. About 8.30, B., who 

 was sitting above me, gently touched my head with his 

 foot. Cautiously looking round, I saw the striped back 

 of a tiger creeping towards the buffalo. It was dread- 

 fully exciting work. Right under me crept the beast. 

 Oh, disappointment, disappointment still ! It was 

 two young cubs about as big as an Irish water-dog. It 

 was perfectly wonderful to see the caution displayed by 

 these little blackguards. They stole round in a circle 

 examining the ground most carefully before they 

 touched their breakfast. At last, satisfied all was right, 

 they set to work and certainly made up for lost time. 



