THE ONE-EYED MAN-EATER. 77 



stop that ; your bullet pinged within an inch of 

 my ear ! Don't crack jokes in that way ! " " Hurry 

 up ! hurry up, for God's sake ! There is the tiger 

 after you ! " I gasped out ; and hastily helped my 

 friend into the machan beside me. We then looked 

 out for the brute, but could see nothing of him. 

 I felt sure of my shot, and declared he must be 

 dead or dying behind one of the ruts. Pro vis 

 was thoroughly scared when I told him of his 

 narrow escape ; and we both vowed we would 

 never attempt tiger-shooting in that manner again. 

 After waiting a quarter of an hour we fired several 

 shots into the air. Waiting an hour and hearing 

 nothing, we again discharged our pieces and then, 

 re-loading carefully, descended and walked to where 

 I last saw the tiger ; but there was no tiger there. 

 Feeling quite sure that we would recover him in 

 the morning, we walked home and received quite 

 an ovation from the natives when I told them that 

 their arch-enemy was slain. Next morning we 

 carefully searched the ground ; but although the 

 mark where my bullet struck the ground and 

 glanced off and the marks of Provis's shoes were 

 distinct, there was not the slightest trace of a 

 tiger's pug anywhere about. To this day I cannot 

 be sure whether it was a tiger I fired at, or merely 

 a phantom of my heated imagination. That the 

 tiger was not dead we had sickening evidence a 

 week later, when the head, arms and legs of a 

 man were brought to us. The poor fellow had 

 been killed the previous day at Ubrani, and the 

 remnants of the tiger's meal were brought us to 



