26 THE FORESTS OF UPPER INDIA 



back. Waiting from noon till dusk produced no result. 

 The villagers at last assembled, and came in a body to 

 perform the last funereal obsequies, and carried away the 

 mangled remains on a charpai to the river-side, where the 

 burning-ghat was. 



Next morning at dawn another search was made through 

 the forest in hopes that the tiger might be hanging about. 

 Motee's other wife was there to complete the cutting of 

 the com. On being asked if she was not afraid to come 

 there by herself, her reply was that Motee had not yet 

 returned home, and that if it was not cut he would not 

 be pleased. It was the will of God if the tiger should 

 come, and the com was ripe. She was as good a bait to 

 sit over as a buffalo calf, so there was nothing better to 

 do than to sit concealed in the thick foliage of a large 

 mango tree which stood opposite the rock, with a couple 

 of rifles ready in case the tiger should choose to repeat 

 his yesterday's performance. Nothing however came, 

 and on Motee's return, if he had to bewail the loss of his 

 ill-fated wife, he had the satisfaction of having his corn 

 cut before it was over-ripe. 



This tiger was not so easily got at, and for three years 

 he had been the terror of all the villages around, stretching 

 from near the Path Dun westward to near where the 

 Ram Ganga issued from the hills into the Terai eastward. 

 The reports sent in to the Deputy-Commissioner showed 

 that seldom a week passed without one or two deaths 

 attributed to the Juli tiger, and that when he had carried 

 off a woman or solitary man in one village, he took him- 

 self off at once, and was next heard of perhaps ten or 

 twenty miles away. The Commissioner had several times 

 sent a dozen Gurkha soldiers from the regiment at 

 Almora, who remained for some months watching to try 

 and shoot the man-eater, but without result ; and one 



