SOME TIGER AND PANTHER STORIES 23 



The mahout managed her well, but he told me 

 that she had been the favourite riding elephant 

 of the Raja of Bustar, and that, on one occasion, 

 when the Raja had gone down to the river to 

 bathe and had dismounted from the elephant, 

 she suddenly seized a man and tore him in two. 

 The Raja, as was said, fell off his chair with 

 fright, and after this, not unnaturally, parted 

 with the elephant. The mahout said that she 

 had killed five or six people at different times 

 after this, but that he had succeeded in reducing 

 her to submission. On one occasion, as he said, 

 he had tied her up for the night and lain down to 

 sleep at a safe distance, but had omitted to remove 

 out of her reach the lance, which is used to subdue 

 a refractory elephant. In the night he felt 

 something in his hair, and, after brushing at it 

 ineffectually, awoke to find that the elephant 

 had got hold of the lance, broken it in two, and 

 was trying to twist one of the broken pieces into 

 his hair so that she might be able to pull him 

 over to her. I am not prepared to vouch for the 

 truth of this story ; but, if it was a lie, it was 

 exceedingly well told, and I saw no reason at the 

 time to doubt the man. He became quite excited 

 at the reminiscence. He was certainly a good 

 mahout, and behaved well on the day when the 

 tiger was shot. 



On any occasion on which I was left alone on 

 the back of the elephant, after hearing these 

 stories, I was always glad to see the mahout 

 return; but my personal relations with the ele- 

 phant were very satisfactory. 



We then started to himt a man-eating family. 



