CLASS I. MAMMALIA: ORDER 5. CARNIVORA. 261 



the desert waste around us. We stopped near two or three of these green tufts, which generally 

 surrounded a lodgment of water, or little pond, in the midst of the sand. 



" The way in which these ferocious animals are traced out is very curious, and if related in 

 England would scarcely be credited. A number of unarmed, half-naked villagers, go prying 

 from side to side of the bush, just as a boy in England would look after a stray sheep, or peep 

 after a bird's nest. Where the jungle was too thick for them to see through, the elephants, 

 putting their trunks down into the bush, forced their way through, tearing up every thing by the 

 roots before them. About four miles from our tents we were all surrounding a bush, which 

 might be some fifty yards in circumference — our all including William Fraser, alone upon his 

 great elephant, Mr. Barton and myself upon another equally large, Mr. Wilder upon another, and 

 eight other elephants, with horsemen at a distance, and footmen peeping into the bushes. Our 

 different elephants were each endeavoring to force his way through, when a great elephant with- 

 out a howduh on his back, called ' Muckna,' put up, from near the center of the bush, a royal 

 tiger. In an instant Fraser called out, ' Now, Lady II., be calm, be steady, and take a good aim ; 

 here he is!' I confess, at the moment of thus suddenly coming upon our ferocious victim, my 

 heart beat very high, and for a second I wished myself far enough off; but curiosity, and the 

 eagerness of the chase, put fear out of my head in a minute ; the tiger made a charge at the 

 Muckna, and then ran back into the jungle. Mr. Wilder then put his elephant in, and drove 

 him out at the opposite side. He charged over the plain away from us, and Wilder fired two balls 

 at him, but knew not whether they took effect. The bush in which he was found was one on 

 the west bank of one of those little half-dry ponds of which I have spoken. Mr. Barton and I 

 conjecturing that, as there was no other thick cover near, he would probably soon return, took 

 our stand in the center of the open space ; in a minute the tiger ran into the bushes on the east 

 side; I saw him quite plain ; we immediately put our elephant into the bushes, and poked about 

 till the horsemen, who were reconnoitring round the outside of the whole jungle, saw him slink 

 under the bushes to the north side ; hither we followed him, and from thence traced him, by his 

 growling, back to the outer part of the eastern bushes. Here he started out just before the 

 trunk of our elephant, with a tremendous growl or grunt, and made a charge at another 

 elephant further out on the plain, retreating again immediately under cover. Fraser fired at 

 him, but we suppose without effect; and he called to us for our elephant to pursue him into 

 his cover. 



"AVith some difficulty we made our way to the inside of the southern bushes; and as we were 

 looking through the thicket, we perceived beau tiger slink away under them. Mr. Barton fired, 

 and hit him a mortal blow about the shoulder or back, for he instantly was checked, and my 

 ball, which followed the same instant, threw him down. We two then discharged our wh.de 

 artillery, which originally consisted of two double-barreled guns, loaded with slugs, and a pair of 

 pistols. Most of them took effect, as we could discover by his wincing, for he was not above ten 

 yards from us at any time, and at one moment, when the elephant chose to take fright and turn 

 his head round away from the beast, running his haunches almost into the bush, not fire. By 

 this time William Fraser had come round, and discharged a few balls at the tiger, which la- 

 looking at us, grinning and growling, his ears thrown back, but unable to stir. A pistol fired by 

 me, shattered his lower jaw-bone ; and immediately, as danger of approaching him was now over, 

 one of the villagers with a matchlock went close to him, and applying the muzzle of his piece to 

 the nape of his neck, shot him dead, and put him out of his pain. The people then dragged him 

 out, and we dismounted to look at him, pierced through and through; yet one could not con- 

 template him without satisfaction, as we were told that he had long infested the high road, and 

 carried off many passengers. One hears of the roar of a tiger, and fancies it like that of a hull ; 

 but in fact it is more like the grunt of a hog, though twenty times louder, and certainly on. 

 the most tremendous animal noises one can imagine." 



Captain Mundy gives us the following spirited description of a tiger-hunt in which lie was 

 engaged. The parties found immense quantities of game, wild hogs, hog-deer, and the neilghi : 

 they however strictly abstained from firing, reserving their whole battery for the nobler garni 

 which they were in pursuit. They had to pass through a thick forest, and the narrator gives a 



