Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/521

 Collectanea. 487

cannot do, he thinks they must be mightily strong. Among the Angamis old men and some young men eat the flesh of tigers and leopards. But a Sema Naga will not touch it, as he looks on men and tigers as of one blood.

[The tiger is another of the savage beasts whom the savage prefers to leave alone, lest by killing one of the species he should excite the hostility of the rest (Sir J. Frazer, The Golden Boughy 3rd ed., part v., vol. ii., p. 215 sg.). The Fanai do not kill tigers, giving as the reason that a former ancestor of theirs once lost his way, and was conducted to his village by a tiger, which kindly allowed him to hold its tail (Lt.-Col. J. Shakespear, The Lushei Kuki Clans, 1912, p. 139). The Lusheis generally do not eat tiger's flesh {Ibid., p. 153). In a legend of the same people it is said that once upon a time a general transformation of men into animals took place, and people who wore striped clothes were turned into tigers {Ibid., p. 93). The belief in a man tiger, that is, a man able to take tiger shape, is common in the Lushei Hills and also in Nepal; in the flood story, all were drowned save a man and a woman who climbed a tree, and hid themselves. In the morning they found that they had become a tiger and a tigress {Ibid., p. xid et seq.). Among the Nagas of Manipur, the Ningthaja or Khul-lakpa clan are not allowed to eat tiger flesh (T. C. Hodson, The Naga Tribes of Manipur, 1911, p. 73).]

VII. Tales of Tigers.

The Sema Nagas say that one day a tiger came across a mar> who was carrying a barking-deer he had killed. He said to the man : "How do you manage to catch deer?" "If you bring me half a miihan {bos frontalis) I will tell you," he replied. So the next day the tiger came with the meat and asked for instructions. " Put the meat on this stick," said the man, "and to-morrow morn- ing you will find a deer sticking to it." The tiger did as he was told, and when he was gone the man took the meat. Ne.\t morn- ing when the tiger came he found nothing there, and he complained to the man. " What bad luck I" he replied. "We must try again. Have you still the other half of that ?nithan ? " The tiger brought the second half, and the same result followed. " Well," said the