168 YOUNG ELEPHANT KILLED BY TIGER. 



if they attempted to walk in advance. On each tame elephant's pad it3 

 attendants had stowed their cooking utensils, spare ropes, and such small 

 articles of cane-work (footstools, baskets, &c.) as they had made in their 

 spare hours, and were taking to Chittagong to sell. Each had a long spear 

 in his hand with which to keep the wild ones in order, if necessary. The 

 small calves marched loose alongside their mothers. Behind the elephants 

 came a fleet of our provision - boats carrying the rations. We usually 

 marched from about 7 a.m. till 12, perhaps ten miles daily, when a halt 

 was made ; the elephants were secured in the forest on the bank of the river ; 

 and the people cooked their breakfasts. I always sent a boat with my tent 

 and servants in advance of the elephants ; they could reach the intended 

 camping - ground by 10 a.m., so everything was ready for me when we 

 arrived. 



But I am anticipating, as two incidents occurred at camp No. 12 after 

 Sergeant Carter left which may be worth mentioning. One was a tiger 

 killing a young elephant, and my shooting the spoiler ; the other, the shoot- 

 ing of a wild elephant in our elephant-lines. 



The day after Sergeant Carter marched, two men returned with a note 

 from him to say that a tiger had killed and partly eaten one of the young 

 elephants of his batch close to his tent during the night ; that he had ordered 

 the carcass to be left undisturbed, and had proceeded on his march. Never 

 having seen such a case before, I mounted an elephant and proceeded to the 

 place. 



The young elephant, a calf about four and a half feet high at the 

 shoulder, and weighing probably sis hundred pounds, had been standing 

 just within the jungle off the encampment when seized, and was within 

 twenty yards of the other elephants and of the sergeant's tent. Its hind- 

 legs only were hobbled, as, being very quiet, it had been allowed almost since 

 its capture, a fortnight before, to roam about the camp thus secured. The 

 tiger had seized it by the throat as a bullock is seized ; there were no other 

 marks on any part of the body, and it had only been dragged a few yards. 

 A large quantity of flesh had been eaten off both hind-quarters. As I did 

 not know at what hour the tiger might return to his kill, and as sitting up 

 all night in the jungles — the thermometer had been at 38° that morning — 

 was not to be thought of, I returned to camp (it was now 4 p.m.), intendiag 

 to try and find the tiger in the morning. 



Next day I went to the carcass with a single pad-elephant and some 

 men, whom I left at a distance whilst I took the elephant to the kill to 

 reconnoitre. The jungle was continuous open forest, except on the river- 

 bank, where there was a dense patch of thorny cane-tliicket. T had calcu- 



