MISC EL LA NEOUS NOTES. 119 



he bolted off yelling into the jungle. In the morning we found him lying 



dead with a stick between his teeth, not more than 50 yards from the pool. 



He was an old male, and one of his hind feet had been wounded in some way, 



either by a bullet, or very likely in a fight with one of his kind. It was an old 



wound, and had long since healed. At any rate, the foot had a clubbed 



appearance, and accounted for the peculiar track which he left, which had 



obtained for him the sozihrvjuct of " the cripple." 



Jesse. 



No. VI.— A TIGER ATTACKING ELEPHANTS.* 



I fancy that it is in the Field that I have seen it stated more than once that 

 a tiger will not aitaek an elcj^liant, or that, on the rare occasions when it does 

 venture to attack one of these huge brutes, it always gets the worst of 

 it. The following facts will, however, I think, help to disprove these statements : 

 —In September last, a timber contractor reported to me that a female elephant 

 and calf had been attacked by a tiger when they had been turned loose to 

 graze at the head-waters of one of the streams which rise in the Pegu Yomahs, 

 and that the calf had been killed. I hardly credited the report at first ; but 

 on inquiry, I found that it was perfectly true. From the footpiints it was 

 evident that the tiger had tackled the calf (a two-year old male) when it had 

 sti-ayed from its mother. Thi* mother had come to the rescue, but was unable 

 to do anything and only got badly mauled about the hind quarter.^, and was 

 apparently driven off ; the calf was killed, and found partly eaten tlie next day. 

 That night, a row ,of spring spears was set by the Karens (who are very cute at 

 this sort of trap), and in the morning it was found that one of these had taken 

 effect and the tiger had gone off with about 3 ft. of it. The greater part of that 

 day the brute was heard in alargepaing grass jungle, roaring, and evidently not 

 at all pleased with the o ft. of bamboo. The next that was heard of him, three 

 nionths later, was that he had lifted two bullocks from a Cutch camp, about 

 forty miles from the scene of his former exploits. Shortly after, another 

 attack on a contractor's elcijhant was rejjorted. It was evident, from the 

 marks on the gro\ind, that the animal, which was a fidl-growii female, had 

 been caught when asleep ; and when I saw it a week afterwards it still had 

 diea'lful marks on the top of its shoulders and in the centre of the back, which 

 could be the work of nothing else but a tiger. It is more than probable 

 that it was the same tiger which had killed the calf three months before, for 

 he was evidently very lame, if not maimed, the marks of three feet being dis- 

 tinct, v/hilst only the claws of the fourth just touched the groimd. The spear 

 had evidently nearly given him his quietus. 



Four days afterwards a tiger tackled another elephant, this time a big 

 tusker, Avorth over Rs. 2,000, which died five days after. In this case it would 



* The above appeared in The Field on 13th February, lb92. 



