Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 2 (1898).djvu/190

158 his growling, and perchance secures a victim. Tigers, it is well known, prey at times on their own tribe, as the following instances will show.

A Leopard was half eaten by a Tiger by the side of a "kill," and there were evident traces of a struggle having taken place. Whether the Tiger ate his enemy out of revenge, or found him fresher and more tasty than the body over which they had fought, I will not hazard an opinion; but, though strange, it is not uncommon either with the hairy or the feathered tribe,—birds of prey doing the same, for I shot a Falcon in the act of feeding on a Kestrel it had struck down. Another instance is known of a Tiger having killed a young Tiger over a dead bullock, and partly eaten him. I have known several instances, when two Tigers have fought in Assam, of the survivor demolishing the defeated.

There is a peculiar and singular distinction in regard to the mode of breaking up their prey between the Tiger and the Panther; the former invariably commencing on the hind quarter of the animal slain, and the latter at the fore quarter or chest. There is no reason shown for this strange difference, but it is a well-established fact, and one perfectly recognized by native shikaries, who will, without hesitation, pronounce which animal is the culprit by observing these particulars.

We now come to an instance where some sportsmen did see a Tiger strike down a cow. "We had been tempted off our proposed line of march on the 11th by the receipt of news of a Tiger having killed two cows in the bed of the river near the village of Pipulkulti; and, encamping at Watoli, had sent our shikaries to tie up Buffaloes near Pipulkulti, and also near Amba, a village in the opposite direction, near which there had been a 'kill' about a week previous. The news came in early from both directions: 'Nothing from Amba, and "no kill" from Pipulkulti'; but Shaikh Boden, our head shikarie, who had inspected the latter place, had found fresh tracks, so we determined to try our luck, and started after breakfast with about twenty coolies for a beat. One mile below Pipulkulti the Pen Gunga river averages in breadth from four to five hundred yards, when a large nullah runs into it from the Berar side. In the bed of the river there are a number of small flat islands covered with a description of Cypress grass, affording sufficient cover for