THE TIGER. 295 



help was, however, to be expected from a terror-stricken popu- 

 lation like this. They lived in barricaded houses ; and only 

 stirred out when necessity compelled in large bodies, covered 

 by armed men, and beating drums and shouting as they passed 

 along the roads. Many villages had been utterly deserted ; 

 and the country was evidently being slowly depopulated by 

 this single animal. So far as I could learn, he had been 

 killing alone for about a year another tiger who had 

 formerly assisted him in his fell occupation having been shot 

 the previous hot weather. Be'tul has always been unusually 

 favoured with man-eaters, the cause apparently being the 

 great numbers of cattle that come for a limited season to graze 

 in that country, and a scarcity of other prey at the time when 

 they are absent, combined with the unusually convenient cover 

 for tigers existing alongside most of the roads. The man-eaters 

 of the Central Provinces rarely confine themselves solely to 

 human food, though some have almost done so to my own 

 knowledge. Various circumstances may lead a tiger to prey 

 on man ; anything, in fact, that incapacitates him from kill- 

 ing other game more difficult to procure. A tiger who has 

 got very fat and heavy, or very old, or who has been disabled 

 by a wound, or a tigress who has had to bring up young cubs 

 where other game is scarce, all these take naturally to man, 

 who is the easiest animal of all to kill, as soon as failure with 

 other prey brings on the pangs of hunger ; and once a tiger has 

 found out how easy it is to overcome the lord of creation, and 

 how good he is to eat, he is apt to stick to him, and, if a tigress, 

 to bring up her progeny in the same line of business. The 

 greater prevalence of man-eaters in one district than in 

 another I consider to be that I have mentioned. Great 

 grazing districts, where the cattle come only for a limited 

 season, are always the worst. Where the cattle remain all 



