raised and sniffing persistently. There was something 

 now that interested them more than the spoor : they 

 winded the tiger itself, but could not tell where. No 

 one stirred : we stood watching the dogs and snatching 

 glances right and left among the boulders and their 

 shady creeper-hidden caves and recesses, and as we 

 stood thus, grouped together in breathless silence, 

 an electrifying snarling roar came from the krans 

 above and the spotted body of the tiger shot like a 

 streak out of the black mouth of a cave and across 

 our front into the bush ; there was a series of crashing 

 bounds, as though a stone rolled from the mountain 

 were leaping through the jungle ; and then absolute 

 silence. 



We explored the den ; but there was nothing of 

 interest in it no remains of food, no old bones, or 

 other signs of cubs. It seemed to be the retreat of 

 a male tiger secluded, quiet, and cool. The opening 

 was not visible from any distance, a split-off slab of 

 rock partly hiding it ; but when we stood upon the 

 rock platform we found that almost the whole of the 

 horseshoe bay in the Berg into which we had de- 

 scended was visible, and it was with a " Wow ! " of 

 surprise and mortification that the kraal boys found 

 they could see the kraal itself and their goats and cattle 

 grazing on the slopes and in the valley below. 



Tigers do not take their kill to their dens unless 

 there are young cubs to be fed ; as a rule they feed 

 where they kill, or as near to it as safety permits, jgj?~ 

 and when they have fed their fill they carry 

 off the remainder of the carcase 

 263 



