262 THE HIGHLANDS OE CENTEAL INDIA. 



in which they had harried a quiet population who did not want 

 their tigers killed at all on their terms, cursing and swearing 

 at them, and perhaps even expressing little regret that a few 

 of them had been sacrificed to their bungling ardour. On the 

 other hand a properly organised expedition, where the sports- 

 man provides his own supplies and his means of hunting the 

 tigers, is certain to meet with every co-operation from the 

 people. They will even crowd in to help in driving the 

 jungles, when they know they are to work for a good sports- 

 man and shot who will not unnecessarily risk their lives. 



With luck and first-rate arrangements a few tigers may be 

 got in the cold weather. A good many persons will remember 

 a hunt in the month of January, 1861, when we secured a 

 royal tiger for the Governor- General of India, on his first visit 

 to the centre of his dominions, within a mile or two of the 

 cantonment of Jubbulpur. I mounted sentry over that beast 

 for nearly a week, girding him in a little hill with a belt of fires, 

 and feeding him with nightly kine, till half a hundred elephants, 

 carrying the cream of a vice-regal camp, swept him out into 

 the plain, where he fell riddled by a storm of bullets from 

 several hundred virgin rifles. He had the honour of being 

 painted by a Landseer, by the blaze of torchlight, under the 

 shadow of the British standard ; and my howdah bore witness 

 for many a day, in a bullet hole through both sides of it, to 

 the accuracy of aim of some gallant member of the staff ! 



At this season tigers sometimes venture very close to large 

 towns, and even to the European stations. Several tigers have 

 been shot within the walls of the town and station of Mandla, 

 and in the " Pdu " gardens round about ; and at Seoni, in 

 1864, I formed one of a party who drove a large tiger out of a 

 tobacco field, within a stone's throw of a considerable village, 

 and shot him in the main street thereof. There was nothing 



