The man-eater being an exception, tigers may be classified as game slayers and cattle killers. Those haunting a jungle where sambhur, cheetul, pig and small antelopes abound take their toll of them. A monkey is quite a delicate morsel, if they can catch an unwary bunder on the ground or fetch him from a low bough by an unexpected spring. Those that take up their residence in cultivated country usually prey on the cattle grazing in the scrub jungle near the villages. A tiger generally rules over a stretch of ground about five miles square and keeps strictly within his own domain. Any intruder of his own sex is speedily ejected. But it is a curious fact that when a tiger is shot, another quickly appears and takes up his abode in the defunct animal's dominions. A certain patch of jungle, a particular nullah, may be the residence of a tiger which is known to be the only one for miles round. But if he is killed his habitat is almost certain of another striped tenant very soon.
The game slayer is not often seen, living as he does in the heart of the jungle and prowling mostly by night. The cattle lifter levies contributions from the villages in his district in turn, usually killing a cow every two or three days. He takes up his residence for the time being near the carcass in some shady spot close to water. He eats about sixty or eighty pounds of beef at his first meal, goes to drink and lies up during the day to digest his heavy meal, returning at night to feed again. If any villager happens to blunder in on his privacy during his siesta, he gives a low, warning growl which usually suffices to scare the intruder off. The natives pay little heed to him and go about their usual pursuits without heeding his proximity.
On my first introduction to the jungle—it was in the Central Provinces years ago—I had a wholesome respect for tigers. When I learned that one lived in the particular part of the forest where I went shooting, I used to feel anything but comfortable as I wandered about in search of sambhur. I marvelled at the unconcerned way in which even women and children traversed this jungle from village to village. One day I climbed down into a deep, narrow ravine in the hope of finding a stag sheltering in it from the unpleasantly hot sun. Suddenly from a clump of bushes above my head came a deep "Wough! wough!" like the bark of a great dog; and a tiger crashed out of it and bounded up and over the edge of the nullah. I swung my rifle round; but he was out of sight before the butt touched my shoulder. My shikaree (native hunter) cried "Bagh! Bagh! (A tiger! a tiger!)" and rushed up past me after the vanished animal. Rather unwillingly I clambered up too; and I was decidedly relieved when, on emerging from the ravine, I found that the ground was covered with grass six feet high, so that pursuit of the tiger was hopeless. However, on calmly considering the matter afterwards, I came to the conclusion that the beast was even more afraid of me than I of him. So I devoted much time and attention to trying to meet him again. Many a night did I sit up for him over a cow tied up as a bait. Time after time I followed his footprints by day and tried to walk him up near the carcass of some deer he had killed and half-eaten. But never again did I see him.
A few months ago in the Kanera Forests I was wandering about one afternoon, shot-gun in hand, in search of jungle fowl for the pot, about half a mile from the Government dâk bungalow—or rest-house—in which I was staying. I was making my way along a narrow path. Just as I reached a spot where it came out on a small clearing in the forest, I heard some heavy animal forcing its way through the undergrowth about forty yards to my left. I stepped out into the open and looked in the direction from whence came the sound, which stopped as soon as I appeared. I stood still for a couple of minutes. Suddenly a tiger, which had evidently been watching me, gave a deep roar and crashed off through the thick jungle. It was useless to try to follow him up even if I had had a rifle instead of a shot-gun. The setting sun warned me that I must hurry home; so I continued on my way. Two hundred yards further on the path led down into a narrow nullah with steep banks. Here I found the fresh prints of the tiger's paws in the mud, the water just oozing into them. Had I come along a few minutes earlier we would have met face to face in the narrow way; and the chances were that, in his hurry to escape, he would have charged me and knocked me down. And a blow from a tiger's paw is not a caress to be courted. But the two incidents will show that these animals are generally anxious to avoid men.
Native shikarees frequently sit up over water for tigers; but European sportsmen usually adopt one of the three following methods. The first and most effective is to shoot them from elephants; but this does not often fall to the lot of the average man. I was fortunate in having the opportunity in Buxa. The second method is to mark down where the animal is lying up after a kill and have him driven by a line of beaters to the spot where the sportsman is concealed.
In the Central Provinces I went out one day with a friend who had arranged such a beat for a tiger which had killed a cow tied up as a bait for him near a village. After a ten miles' drive we reached this village; and, having had an early start, we breakfasted under a tree on a hillock just above a long nullah which seamed the bare, brown fields with a winding line of green. Below us the hundred and sixty coolies collected as beaters squatted and smoked until the Sahibs were ready. Just as we had finished our meal, a cow burst out of the jungle in the nullah and dashed in among the groups of men. They caught her and became very excited over her. We could see them crowding round her, talking volubly. Then the cow was led up to us; and we found that she was bleeding from a wound in the throat. All down her flanks and rump ran long scratches as if from the claws of a monster cat. This told us plainly that the tiger we were in quest of was still in the nullah and that the cow had stumbled on him unawares. The tiger had evidently tried to seize it but, gorged with his night's meal, missed the fatal neck-breaking spring and, as the cow fled, struck out and clawed it behind.
The coolies cried "Wah! wah! the shaitan's (devil's) last day has dawned. See how the cow has come straight to the Sahib's feet to show her wounds and claim justice!" I am afraid the animal's bovine intelligence was not equal to this, but, in terror, she was only making for her village and safety.
We waited under our tree until the day was at its hottest, so that the tiger, when driven, would be all the more reluctant to face the burning sun in the open and would retreat along the nullah in the shade; for where the ravine forked off in two branches machâns, strong wooden platforms, had been built for us up in the trees, one commanding each branch. We took a short cut across the open in the terrific heat. The pitiless sun beat down on us as we walked over the shadeless fields, and seemed to boil the brains in our skulls. It was a relief to reach the nullah and the cool shelter of the trees in it. We climbed up into our respective machâns, which were about a mile away from where the beaters were to begin the drive. I could see my friend perched up in his tree across the bank dividing his branch of the nullah from mine. This bank was covered with undergrowth from which sprang a line of trees. In these a number of langurs—the big grey apes with black faces surrounded by a fringe of white whisker, which gives them a comic resemblance to aged negroes, a resemblance increased by their white eyebrows—were playing. They came to look at us, leaping from bough to bough, stooping and craning their necks to see us as we sat hidden by the leafy screens around our machns. Then, their curiosity satisfied, they continued their play and swung through the branches away in the direction of the beaters. For a couple of hours I sat drowsing in the intense heat. The silence was profound. Suddenly loud cries, the drumming of tom-toms, and the tapping of sticks against tree-trunks, told me that the drive had begun. I looked to my rifle and sat ready. The noise drew nearer; every nerve in my body was aquiver. Then in the tree-tops pandemonium broke loose. The langurs were coming back towards us, leaping from branch to branch, shrieking, chattering with rage at something moving along beneath them. It was evidently the tiger, their foe as well as ours, which was trying to steal away silently before the beaters. The apes seemed to know his design and to be endeavouring to foil him. I really believe that they realised that our presence boded no good to him; for several looked at me as much as to say:
"Here he is. He is trying to escape. We won't let him creep off unnoticed."
I had read of this extraordinary behaviour on the part of monkeys during a beat in Captain Forsyth's interesting book, "The Highlands of Central India"; but I could scarcely credit it. But now I saw these langurs following the tiger's progress and shrieking abuse down at him. He seemed to be coming straight for me; and my heart rejoiced. But suddenly from the change of direction of the apes I saw that he had turned, crossed the dividing bank, and was going down the other nullah. Then I heard a deep short growl; and at the same moment my friend's rifle went up to his shoulder and he fired. Mad with excitement and furious at being unable to see what was happening, I did a very foolish thing. I slipped down from my tree and dashed through the undergrowth to the brink of the nullah. I saw the tiger rush across the narrow ravine and spring up the opposite bank, which was higher than the one on which I stood. Near the top his strength seemed to fail him. He clung on desperately, unable to pull himself up. My friend fired again; and the brute, struck in the foreleg, dropped back into the nullah. He rolled over and over in agony, biting at his paws and tearing them with his teeth. I fired at his shoulder. Even then he rolled about for a few minutes; and then his head fell back, his frame stiffened and he lay still.