swinging it round him, or, of himself circling round it 

 perhaps that is the fairer description, for the porcupine 

 was much the heavier. He had it by the throat 

 where the flesh is bare of quills, and had kept himself 

 out of reach of the terrible spikes by pulling away' 

 all the time, just as he had done with the duiker 

 and other buck to avoid their hind-feet. 



This encounter with the porcupine gave us a better 

 chance of getting the tiger than we ever expected 

 too good a chance to be neglected ; so we cut the 

 animal up and used the worthless parts to bait the big 

 tiger-trap, having first dragged them across the veld 

 for a good distance each way to leave a blood spoor 

 which would lead the tiger up to the trap. This, 

 with the quantity of blood spread about in the fight, 

 lying right in the track of his usual prowling ought 

 to attract his attention, we thought ; and we fastened 

 the trap to a big tree, making an avenue of bushes up 

 to the bait so that he would have to walk right over the 

 trap hidden under the dead leaves, in order to get at 

 the bait. We hoped that, if it failed to hold, it would 

 at least wound him badly enough to enable us to 

 follow him up in the morning. 



In the bright light of the fire that night, as Jock 

 lay beside me having his share of the porcupine steaks, 

 I noticed something curious about his chest, and on 

 looking closer found the whole of his white * shirt 

 front ' speckled with dots of blood ; he had been 

 pricked in dozens of places, and it was clear that it 

 had been no walk-over for him ; he must have had a 

 pretty rough handling before he got the porcupine 



255 ' 



