THE TIGER. 279 



given up all idea of halting for the tigers another day, when 

 a fine tall young Gaoli stepped up with a salaam and said, 

 " Sahib, I have lost a very fine young buffalo in the jungle, 

 and it will very probably be snapped up by the tigers ; but if 

 you would send some one along that road perhaps he might 

 find it, and we will be pleased if your Highness will keep it, 

 as you are going away from this to-morrow.' He grinned a 

 broad grin as he finished, and I spotted his game ; so sending 

 along the " Lalla " about a quarter of a mile we found a very 

 sufficient young wall-eyed buffalo tied by a piece of straw 

 rope to a little tree ! We had barely time to get the little 

 brute put out in a proper place before nightfall ; but he was 

 duly taken, and we shot a fine tigress, and wounded and lost 

 a tiger, the next day ! 



The morning after the baits have been tied out a shikdri 

 should go to see the result, untying and bringing in those that 

 have not been taken, and following up the tracks from any 

 that have, so far as to ascertain fully whereabouts the tiger is 

 likely to be found later in the day. 'I have mentioned above 

 " the Lalla," and that brings me to the subject of shikdris. 

 A really first-class tiger shikdri is extremely rare. The 

 combination of qualities required to make him is seldom 

 found in a native. I shall best explain what he should 

 be by describing the Lalla. And first as to his name. " Lalla" 

 means in Upper India a clerk of the K&yat caste, to which 

 our friend belonged; so that though utterly ignorant of all 

 letters save those imprinted on a sandy ravine-bed by a tiger's 

 paw, he was nicknamed the Lalla by the people, and there- 

 upon his real name disappeared for ever ; and, when he was 

 afterwards killed by a tiger, no one had any idea what it was. 

 He was a little, wee man, so insignificant and so dried and 

 shrivelled up that, as he used to say, " No tiger would ever 



