A TIGER KILLED. 
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must be immediately cleared by human labour, though 
if the water should be fast subsiding, this is often 
impracticable ; there is then no alternative but to 
allow the stranded boat to remain through the season 
upon the shoal, until at the periodical monsoon the 
water rises sufficiently high to float her. 
The evening after our disaster a budgerow, in 
which was an English officer, passed us on its way 
to Benares. As we moored near the same spot, he 
invited us on board his boat. There was spread 
upon the roof of the cabin the skin of a large tiger 
which he had killed the preceding day. He told us 
that as the dandies were preparing to start in the 
morning, his budgerow being close to the shore, a 
tiger rushed from a neighbouring covert, and spring- 
ing into it, seated itself upon the roof of the cabin. 
The boatmen instantly crept out of sight : the officer 
loaded his rifle and desired his servant to tie a 
rope to one of the small beams of the boat and, 
having first made a running noose, slip the reverse 
end gently over the animal’s tail, which hung down 
on the outside of the cabin ; — this object was there- 
fore easily accomplished. No sooner did the fierce 
beast feel the pressure of the cord, than it sprang in 
wild alarm from the cabin-roof, and such was the 
impetuosity of its spring, that the beam gave way, 
and, when it gained the shore, was hanging at its 
tail. The tiger rolled on the bank with pain, writh- 
ing and yelling furiously, and the officer, taking a 
deliberate aim from the cabin-window, shot it dead. 
On the morrow we floated again upon the broad 
bosom of the Ganges, which was hourly widening as 
