THE ROYAL TIGER OF BENGAL. 45 



Fious venosa by the side of a nul-swamp in 

 Purneah, under whose shade I have often rested 

 in the middle of a hot day's tiger shooting in 

 March or April. It stood alone, and was evidently a 

 favourite resort of the tigers, for it was deeply and 

 numerously scored by their claws. 



Tigers do not, as a general rule, climb trees ; but 

 when pressed by fear, as during an inundation, or 

 when no other way of escape offers from real or 

 imaginary danger, they have occasionally been known 

 to do so. They have also been seen to clamber 

 up or even spring to a certain height, where they 

 have seen a man, and whence they thought the shot 

 came, and pull him down. I have heard of 

 authentic instances where this happened. Nor are 

 they wont to spring to any great height from the 

 ground ; though an instance occurred recently, re- 

 lated by an eye-witness, where a tiger pulled a. 

 native, in one spring, out of a tree at a height of 

 eighteen feet from the ground. The tiger's usual 

 •attack is a rush accompanied by a series of short 

 deep ^xjwls or- roars, in which he evidently 

 thinks he will do much by intimidation; when 

 he charges home he rises on the hind feet, 

 seizes with the teeth and clawsj endeavours, and 

 often succeeds,, in pulling down the object seized. 

 They do occasionally leave- the ground with a 

 spring, clear a fen-ce or ditch, or even alight on the 

 elephant's head, his. pad, or hind quarters ; but 

 this probably happens in the case of tigresses or 



D 



