56 WILD ANIMALS. 



coloured in a most beautiful way, being striped all along the sides 

 with black, red, and white. These are trained to catch boars and 

 wild cattle, bears, wild asses, stags, and other great or fierce 

 beasts ; and 'tis a rare sight, I can tell you, to see those lions 

 give chase to such beasts as I have mentioned ! When they are 

 to be so employed the lions are taken out in a covered cart, and 

 every lion has a httle doggie with him. [They are obliged to 

 approach the game against the wind, otherwise the animal would 

 scent the approach of the lion and be off."] 



Colonel Yule, in a note referring to the tiger being called a lion, 

 writes : " The conception of a tiger seems to have dropped out of 

 the European mind during the middle ages. Thus, in a mediaeval 

 bestiary a chapter on the tiger begins, Une besto qui est apele'e tigre 

 c'est une maniere de serpent. Hence Polo can only call the tiger, 

 whose portrait he draws here not incorrectly, lions." 



Tigers were also trained for hunting purposes in other countries, 

 although one can hardly realize that there was not a considerable 

 risk incurred by the hunters themselves of being converted into 

 the victims to be hunted. Sir John Chardin, in his " Travels in 

 Persia," says : " In hunting the larger animals they make use of 

 beasts of prey trained for the purpose — lions, leopards, tigers, 

 panthers, ounces." 



In the cities of Persia it is no uncommon sight to see 

 tame lions, or generally lionesses, being led about the streets 

 with a chain, or asleep on the pavement in front of the reli- 

 gious mendicants who train these creatures for their purpose. 

 In India tame tigers are also frequently met with, being led 

 about by natives, who often use them in the same way, as an' 

 attraction for begging purposes. Major-G-eneral Burton, describing 

 the " Ooroos," a great Mahomedan festival he witnessed, writes : 

 " At intervals, along the sides of the street, several tame tigers 

 are sitting, held with long ropes and chains by their owners, a 

 peculiar tribe of religious mendicants or begging saints, who 

 tame these fierce animals in a wonderful manner. The crowd pass 

 close by them with perfect unconcern, and their masters, usually 

 three to each tiger, hold the side-ropes attached to their leather 

 collars, and incessantly jingle a shrill-sounding rattle, the noise 



