Bidding Spottie remain where he was, Don followed. The captain was, perhaps, ten paces in advance. Suddenly the jungle parted with a loud swish, and a tawny body shot through the air and alighted full upon the captain's back, bearing him to the ground ere he could utter so much as a cry.
Don stood petrified. Then a savage, guttural growling, accompanied by a sickening crunching sound, roused him to the old sailors danger. There was just sufficient light left to show the two figures on the ground—the tiger atop, his fangs buried in the captains thigh. Priming the musket rapidly with some loose powder he happened to have in his pocket, Don sprang to the captain's aid. The tiger lifted its head at his approach with an angry snarl, but this was no time to think of his own danger. Quick as thought he thrust the muzzle of the musket between the beast's jaws and fired.
An instant later and he was on his back. The tiger had sprung clean over him, knocking him down in its passage, and now lay some yards away, writhing in the death struggle. Don picked himself up and ran to the old sailor's side. As he reached the spot where he lay, the captain struggled into a sitting posture, and stared about him bewilderedly.
“Stave my bulkhead!” roared he, “if this bain't the purtiest go as ever I see. An' what quarter o' the animile kingdom might the warmint hail from? I axes.”
“A tiger, captain; a genuine man-eater. But, I say, are you hurt?”
“Hurt is it?” demanded the captain. “Why, dye see, lad,” first adjusting his neckcloth, and then proceeding to feel himself carefully over, “barrin' this 'ere bit of a chafe to my figgerhead, I hain't started a nail, d'ye see. Avast there! Shiver my main-brace, what's this? I axes.”
Just where the “main-brace” was spliced upon the thigh, a sad rent in the captain's broad pantaloons showed the wooden portion of his anatomy to be deeply indented and splintered. At this discovery he stopped aghast in the process of feeling for broken bones.
“Why, don't you see how it is?” laughed Don. “The brute has tried to make a meal off your wooden leg, captain.”
The captain burst into one of his tremendous guffaws. “Blow me if I don't admire the warmint's taste,” said he. “An uncommon affectionate un he is, says you, so let's pay our respec's to him 'ithout delay, lad.”
The tiger proved to be a magnificent specimen of his tribe; and, as he stood over the 'tawny carcase in the waning light, Don could not repress a feeling of pardonable pride at thought of his own share in the adventure which had ended so disastrously for the superb creature at his feet.