276 FROM THE ANIMALS' POINT OF VIEW 
mingling his breath with ours, tearing away scalp or 
shoulder-blade.” But the 44 fellow-creature ” is not 
nearly so impracticable as he is supposed to be. 
More human beings are probably killed by tigers 
than by any other wild beast, except by starving 
wolves. Yet this is what Sir Samuel Baker has to 
say on the subject — 44 There is a great difference in 
the habits of tigers. Some exist upon the game in 
the jungles ; others prey especially upon the flocks 
belonging to the villagers. A few are designated 
4 man-eaters.’ These are sometimes naturally ferocious, 
and having attacked a human being, may have de- 
voured the body, and thus acquired a taste for human 
flesh ; or they may have been wounded on more than 
one occasion, and have learnt to regard man as a 
natural enemy. But more frequently the 4 man-eater ’ 
is a very old tiger, or more probably tigress, that, 
having hunted in the neighbourhood of villages and 
carried off some unfortunate woman, has discovered 
that it is far easier to kill a native than to hunt 
jungle game.” As a rule, the tiger is only anxious to 
avoid men ; and it is noticed that in high grass tigers 
are more dangerous than in forests, because in the 
former they cannot be seen, neither can they see, until 
the stranger is close upon them. An ancient instance 
of the opposite behaviour is that recorded of the new 
colonists of Samaria, whom the lions attacked, 44 and 
slew some of them.” A curious inversion of this ex- 
perience occurred when the islands in the Brahmaputra, 
which were swarming with tigers, were first cultivated. 
