SHOTS AT TIGERS 149 



immediately afterwards. I had just finished my dinner when 

 the mahouts returned, saying the tiger was not dead, but 

 eating the cow ! It was too dark to do anything then, but 

 I told them to be ready at daylight. There was my tiger, 

 dead enough, but the cow had been demolished, and her 

 bones scattered about. I asked where the mud-pool was that, 

 the tiger had bathed in, and a villager said close by. I went 

 up to it and started the tigress at once, got two snap-shots, 

 but failed to bag her ; and as I was pressed for time and she 

 had got into a tangled forest, I told the local shikarie to look 

 her up. I left the greater part of my impedimenta here, and 

 after seeing the tiger's skin pegged out, I started on pony- 

 back for my destination, with just my bedding and a few 

 necessaries which had been sent on in the early morning on 

 a fast pad elephant. I got to Shoayghein by the evening, 

 and put up with Watson of the Artillery. I was very busy 

 there looking after a bazaar that I was constructing, for three 

 days, and then rode back to Thabew, getting there by the 

 evening. I had three good ponies, two as relays. The 

 tigress had not been recovered, but the local man had a 

 couple of panther cubs ; he offered them to me for a rupee, 

 but as there was no milk to be got, I refused them. I believe 

 he got his own wife to suckle them till he got a goat from 

 the Karens, but whether he ever reared them I never heard. 



April 20. I started early for Chowteah. I went straight 

 across country, and it was very hard work for the elephants 

 to push their way through the long and entangled grass, 

 which evidently had not been burned for years. The stems 

 were more like bamboos. Elephants are the only beasts which 

 can make their way through these heavy prairies, and in the 

 tracks they make, gaur and buffaloes follow. I soon lost sight 

 of the other elephants, and coming on a recent track I told my 

 mahout to follow it. There seemed no prospect of sport, so 

 I was sitting down reading, when there was a snort ; I dropt 

 the book, and just saw the tail of a gaur disappearing. I had 

 no time to fire. It is a very reprehensible habit, reading in a 

 howdah, as many shots are lost by it. When too late, I put 

 the book away, and took up the rifle, but for an hour I saw 

 nothing, and was all but smothered by the dusty fluff from 



