“Very fine tiger-hunt, sar,” observed the interpreter to Courtenay, with exultation.
“Very fine indeed: Seymour, this is something like a battue. What would some of your English sportsmen have given to have been here? But, interpreter, I don’t see any tigers.”
“Great tigers? No, sar, no great tiger in this country. Call dis tiger?” said the man, pointing with his finger to a prostrate leopard.
Such is the case—the regal Bengal tiger, as well as his rival the lion, admits of no copartnership in his demesnes. On the banks of the impetuous rivers of India, he ranges, alone, the jungles which supply his wants, and permits them not to be poached by inferior sportsmen. Basking his length in the sun and playing about his graceful tail, he prohibits the intrusion of the panther or the leopard. His majestic compeer seems to have entered into an agreement with him, that they shall not interfere with each other’s manorial rights, and where you find the royal tiger, you need not dread the presence of the lion. Each has established his dominion where it has pleased him, both respecting each other, and leaving the rest of the world to be preyed upon by their inferiors.
“Well, Prose, how many did you kill?”
“Why, to tell you the truth, Seymour, I never fired my musket. I was so astonished and so frightened that I could not; I never believed that there were so many beasts in the whole universe.”
“I am convinced,” observed Macallan, “that I saw an animal hitherto undescribed—I fired at it, but an antelope bounded by as I pulled my trigger, and received the ball—I never regretted anything so much in my life. Did you see it?”
“I saw a number of most indescribable animals,” replied Courtenay; “but let us descend, and walk over the field of slaughter.”
The party dismounted, and for some time amused themselves with examining the variety of the slain. The deer and antelopes were the most plentiful; but, on enumeration, nine panthers and leopards, and fifteen wild-boars, headed the list. Prose and Seymour were walking side by side, when they perceived a monkey sitting on the ground, with a most pitiful face; it was of a small variety, with a long tail; it made no effort to escape as they approached it, but on the contrary appeared to court their notice, by looking at them with a melancholy air, and uttering loud cries, as if in pain.
“Poor little fellow,” said Seymour, apostrophising the animal, “it looks as if it were a rational being.—Where are you hurt?”