A GRIFFIN'S EXPLOIT. 31^ 



ready to accompany us ; these were actively engaged in abusing their fol- 

 lowers. We should have taken warning from the reluctance to enter 

 exhibited by men who had, before the tigress was fired at, gone in without 

 hesitation ; but thinking they only wanted an example, we selected a point 

 of entry where there was a clear space between the nets and the jungle 

 inside of about six feet in width, and entered, followed by three gun-bearers 

 and our volunteers. 



In front of us was a thick hedge of bushes, four and a half feet high ; 

 this had been thrown up by the spearmen the evening before as a defence 

 whilst waiting for nets to complete the circle ; beyond the hedge was dense 

 jungle. I believe other Torreas would have followed, as they were by no 

 means wanting in pluck, but at this moment one of the three spearmen 

 thrust his spear into the hedge to make a gap. The tigress was lying 

 behind it and sprang up with a short roar, rearing on her hind-legs. The 

 upper half of her body only was visible ; she held her paws liigh, and I felt 

 she towered over me, as I was in advance. In another instant we should 

 probably have been struck down, when we both fired into her chest. She 

 glared at us for a brief instant, in which she might certainly have seized 

 either of us, as I was puUing wildly at the trigger of the already discharged 

 barrel, this being my first experience of a tiger at very close quarters, and 

 M. for some reason had not followed up his shot. She at last sank slowly 

 out of sight, much to our relief I have no doubt. She must have been 

 within a few feet of us when we entered, and was probably regarding our 

 calves with much interest through the hedge. 



After she disappeared we effected an orderly retreat. She was now 

 seen from outside lying dead, so having fired two more shots into her to 

 make sure, we again went in and brought her out. She had only moved 

 ten feet from where we shot her. One bullet had entered the centre of her 

 chest and had come out alongside her spine ; the other had gone through her 

 right shoulder. She was not more than two feet from the muzzles of our 

 guns when we fired, and her chest was singed. We can only account for 

 her not springing upon us by supposing either that the shot near the spine 

 crippled her, or that her astonishment overcame aU other feelings wlien, 

 instead of encountering the " mild Hindoo " of the country, she received 

 such a warm reception from two " Sahibs." Truly a good angel watches 

 over griffins. 



A small boy near Morlay had a narrow escape from a cattle-ldlling 

 tiger on one occasion. He was a youngster, eight years of age, the son of 

 one of my men, and whilst tending sheep had formed his little black 

 blanket into a bag, and swung it, fiUed with reeds, on liis back. Whilst 



