A FAMILY OF TIGERS. 109 



jungle, there is no other left in it, and that to continue the 

 search would be both time and labour wasted. Experience 

 proves that a second or even a third beat after the death of 

 one tiger will often result in a very gratifying addition to the 

 day's bag. Time after time, when a report has been brought 

 that a tiger or tigress had been marked down in a certain 

 place, I have found two or three. This animal is not the 

 unsociable creature it is commonly understood to be ; on the 

 contrary, it is fond of consorting with others, and not seldom 

 three or four may be found together; a mother and nearly 

 full grown cubs; both parents and half-grown ones, or a 

 charming party of young males and females living and 

 hunting together for a considerable length of time. 



It is truly a grand sight to see four brindled beauties 

 spring up together out of the same small patch of grass, and 

 go bounding over it, heads and tails well up. When a number 

 are thus roused together, coolness and steadiness are essential 

 to the successful padding of all, since " Mahouts " and ele- 

 phants, not to mention the sportsmen, are apt to become 

 excited on seeing three or four when only one was expected. 



One morning after parade I beat up a patch of exceedingly 

 strong and tall reeds near my lines at Telain, in Cachar, in 

 which a tiger was said to have been marked down ; instead of 

 one four were put up, all full grown beauties. On another 

 occasion, having gone to shoot a tiger which had killed an ox 

 tied up the night before, no less than three rose off the carcase, 

 and all were slain in less than a quarter of an hour. 



The following incident furnishes an example of unexpected 

 good fortune not availed of by those to whom it presented 

 itself. A pony having been killed by a tiger in the old Hill 

 station of Cherra Poonjee, some officers of the Sylhet Light 

 Infantry (now the 44th N. I.) proceeded to the ruins of an old 

 bungalow, out of a broken window of which they watched the 

 "kill" a little before sunset. Shortly afterwards three full- 

 grown tigers crept up together from the valley immediately 

 below the ruins, and at once making for the carcase com- 

 menced eating it not twenty paces from the concealed rifle- 



