their javelins; and in this manner disable him before he is attacked by the dogs, many of whom he would otherwise destroy. He is very vivacious, and is never killed at once, but continues to fight desperately, even after he has received his mortal blow. He is also taken by pit-falls; the natives digging a deep hole in the ground, and covering it slightly over with sticks and earth; which, however, give way beneath his weight, and he sinks to the bottom, from whence he has no means of escape. But the most usual manner of taking this animal is while a cub, and incapable of resistance. The place near the den of the lioness is generally well known by the greatness of her depredations on that occasion; the natives, therefore, watch the time of her absence, and aided by a swift horse, carry off her cubs, which they sell to strangers, or to the great men of their country."

The lion, while young and active, lives by hunting in the forest, at the greatest distance from any human habitation, and seldom quits this retreat while able to subsist by his natural industry; but when he becomes old, and unfit for the purposes of surprise, he boldly comes down into places more frequented, attacks the flocks and herds that take shelter near the habitation of the shepherd or the husbandman, and depends rather upon his courage than his address for support. It is remarkable, however, that when he makes one of these desperate sallies, if he finds men and quadrupeds in the same field, he only attacks the latter, and never meddles with men, unless they provoke him to engage. It is observed that he prefers the flesh of camels to any other food; he is likewise said to be fond of that of young elephants; these he often attacks before their trunk is yet grown; and, unless the old elephant comes to their assistance, he makes them an easy prey.

The lion is terrible upon all occasions, but particularly at those seasons when he is incited by desire, or when the female has brought forth. It is then that the lioness is seen followed by eight or ten males, who fight most bloody battles among each other, till one of them becomes victorious over all the rest. She is said to bring forth in spring, and to produce but once a year. "With respect to the time of gestation, naturalists have been divided; some asserting that the lioness went with young six months, and others but two. The time also of their growth and their age have hitherto been left in obscurity; some asserting that they acquired their full growth in three years, and others that they required a longer period to come to perfection; some saying (and among this number is Mr. Buffon) that they lived to but twenty or twenty two years at most; others making their lives even of shorter duration. All these doubts are now reduced to certainty; for we have had several of these animals bred in the Tower; so that the manner of their copulation, the time of their gestation, the number they bring forth, and the time they take to come to perfection, are all pretty well known. Although the lion emits his urine backwards, yet he couples in the ordinary manner; and, as was said before, his internal structure in almost every respect resembles that of a cat. The lioness, however, is upon these occasions particularly fierce, and often wounds the lion in a terrible manner. She goes with young, as I am assured by her keeper, no more than five months; the young ones, which are never more than two in number when brought forth, are about the size of a large pug dog, harmless, pretty, and playful; they continue the teat for twelve months, and the animal is more than five years in coming to perfection. As to its age, from its imprisoned state, we can have no certainty; since it is very probable that, being deprived of its natural climate, food, and exercise, its life must be very much abridged. However, naturalists have hitherto been greatly mistaken as to the length of its existence. The great * PROCREATION.—Within a few years, the keepers of menageries have been successful in procuring the continuance of the species, from a lion and lioness in confinement. Se veral full-grown examples have been reared in this way in England. The cubs are always playful and harmless; but as they approach

to maturity, they invariably put on the natural habits of the race, and are, generally, as little to be trifled with as those which are whelped in the woods. The nurture of these animals under confinement tends to soften their character, as in the case of one of the Warwick lions.

he-lion, called Pompey, which died in the year 1760, was known to have been in the Tower for above seventy years; and one lately died there, which was brought from the river Gambia, that died above sixty-three. The lion, therefore, is a very long-lived animal; and very probably, in his native forests, his age exceeds even that of man himself."

In this animal all the passions, even of the most gentle kind, are in excess, but particularly the attachment of the female to her young. The lioness, though naturally less strong, less courageous, and less mischievous than the lion, becomes terrible when she has got young ones to provide for. She then makes her incursions with even more intrepidity than the lion himself; she throws herself indiscriminately among men and other animals, destroys without distinction, loads herself with the spoil, and brings it home reeking to her cubs, whom she accustoms betimes to cruelty and slaughter. She usually brings forth in the most retired and inaccessible places; and when she fears to have her retreat discovered, often hides her tracks, by running back her ground, or by brushing them out with her tail. She sometimes also, when her apprehensions are great, transports them from one place to another; and, if obstructed, defends them with determined courage, and fights to the last.

The lion is chiefly an inhabitant of the torrid zone; and, as was said, is always most formidable there: nevertheless, he can subsist in more temperate climates; and there was a time when even the southern parts of Europe were infested by him. At present he is only found in Africa and the East Indies; in some of which countries he grows to an enormous height. The lion of Bildulgerid is said to be nearly five feet high, and between nine and ten feet from the tip of the nose to the insertion of the tail. The ordinary size is between three and four feet; the female being in all her dimensions about one-third less than the male.

THE TIGER. "The ancients had a saying, That as the peacock is the most beautiful among birds, so is the tiger among quadrupeds. (g) In fact, no quadruped can be more beau

* TIGER AND THE LION.-The lion is called the "monarch of the forest," not only from his majestic appearance, but from the inference that all animals fly before him. But this title of king of the beasts, may be disputed by the tiger. Although these wild dwellers of the desert exhibit a strikingly different external appearance, yet their internal

conformation is the same. The largest as well as the fiercest lions are to be found in the interior of Africa; while the tiger in the East Indies is more powerful than any met with in other parts of the world. It is the undisputed master of the Indian forest. Indeed the royal tiger of Bengal is more than a match for the Asiatic lion. A British officer, who (β) Ου χ'η λεοντος σκυμνον εν πολει τρέφειν.

Unhappily, however, this animal's disposition is as mischievous as its form is admirable, as if Providence was willing to show the small value of beauty, by bestowing it on the most noxious of quadrupeds."

The chief and most observable distinction in the tiger, and in which it differs from all others of the mottled kind, is in the shape of its colours, which run in streaks or bands in the same direction as his ribs, from the back down to the belly. The leopard, the panther, and the ounce, are all partly covered like this animal, but with this difference, that their colours are broken in spots all over the body; whereas in the tiger they stretch lengthwise, and there is scarce a round spot to be found on his skin. Besides this, there are other observable distinctions: the tiger is much larger, and often found bigger even than the lion himself: it is much slenderer also in proportion to its size; its legs shorter, and its neck and body longer. In short, of all other animals, it most resembles the cat in shape; and if we conceive the latter magnified to a very great degree, we shall have a tolerable idea of the former.

In classing carnivorous animals, we may place the lion foremost; (g) and immediately after him follows the tiger, which seems to partake of all the noxious qualities of the lion, without sharing any of his good ones. To pride, courage,

and strength, the lion joins greatness, clemency, and generosity; but the tiger is fierce without provocation, and cruel without necessity. The lion seldom ravages except when excited by hunger; the tiger, on the contrary, though glutted with slaughter, is not satisfied, still continues the carnage, and seems to have its courage only inflamed by not finding resistance.

Happily for the rest of nature, that this animal is not common, and that the species is chiefly confined to the warmest provinces of the East.* The tiger is found in Malabar, in Siam, in Bengal, and in all the countries which are inhabited by the elephant or the rhinoceros.† Some even pretend that it has a friendship for, and often accompanies the latter, in order to devour its excrements, which serve it as a purge. Be this as it will, there is no doubt but that they are often seen together at the sides of lakes and rivers; where they are probably both compelled to go by the thirst which in that torrid climate they must very often endure. It is likely enough, also, that they seldom make war upon or when a tiger felt himself severely wounded, and was roused to revenge by despair, his aim was to remain concealed, and to make off as quietly as possible. It was after he had broken cover, or when he found himself in a situation so as to be fairly at bay, that the serious part of the sport began, in which case he attacked his enemies boldly, and always died fighting. **** When a tiger springs on an elephant, the latter is generally able to shake him off under his feet, and then woe be to him! The elephant either kneels on him, and crushes him at once, or gives him a kick which breaks half his ribs, and sends him flying, perhaps 20 paces."-HEBER'S JOURNAL, abridged.

against being over-run with them in every direction. In some districts, the rewards held forth by government and by individuals, have, without doubt, produced benefit: but such efforts must be confined to particular spots, and never could affect those immense jungles, stretching along the boundaries of Bengal for at least a thousand miles on each side, and extending in many places two or three hundred miles in breadth. These grand depots, to which neither man, horse, nor elephant can have access, and in which deer, &c. abound, supplying the superior beasts of prey with ample sustenance, could not fail, but for some powerful curb, to cause such an augmentation as must, in time, annihilate not only every animal a tiger could destroy, but ultimately the tigers themselves must perish of hunger.”— ORIENTAL FIELD Sports.

*IN WHAT NUMERICAL PROPORTION.-In the eastern countries, where the tiger abounds, they are not found in such numbers as natural procreation would lead us to conclude they were. "I am strongly inclined to think," says Captain Williamson, "that tigers are peculiarly subject to some acute distemper, which carries off great numbers; or that they have some very powerful enemy, with which we are unacquainted; else, if we admit that a tigress bears two cubs annually; nay, if we calculate that she rears but one in three years, during a period of twelve years, we should find the increase so prodigious, as to leave no chance (g) The remainder of this description is taken from Mr. Buffon, except where marked with

commas.

BENGAL TIGER FOUND IN SIBERIA. Ehrenberg, during his journey through Siberia, made a discovery of great interest for the geography of animals, and in some respects for the history of fossil bones, viz. the existence of the great tiger of Bengal in Northern Asia, between the latitudes of Paris and Berlin. He also describes a great panther, with long hair (Felis irbis), he met with in the Altain chain of mountains.-ARCANA OF SCIENCE, 1832.

each other, the rhinoceros being a peaceable animal, and the tiger knowing its strength too well to venture the engagement. It is still more likely that the tiger finds this a very convenient situation, since it can there surprise a greater number of animals, which are compelled thither from the same motives. In fact, it is generally known to lurk near such places where it has an opportunity of choosing its prey, or rather of multiplying its massacres. When it has killed one, it often goes to destroy others, swallowing their blood at large draughts, and seeming rather glutted than satiated with its abundance.*

However when it has killed a large animal, such as a horse or a buffalo, it immediately begins to devour it on the spot, fearing to be disturbed. In order to feast at its ease, it carries off its prey to the forest, dragging it along with such ease, that the swiftness of its motion seems scarce retarded by the enormous load it sustains. From this alone we may judge of its strength; but, to have a more just idea of this particular, let us stop a moment to consider the dimensions of this most formidable creature.† Some travellers have compared it for size to a horse, and others to a buffalo, while others have contented themselves with saying that it was much larger than a lion. We have recent accounts of this animal's magnitude that deserve the utmost confidence. Mr. Buffon has been assured by one of his friends, that he saw a tiger, in the East Indies, of fifteen feet long. Supposing that he means including the tail, this animal, allowing four feet for that, must have been eleven feet from the tip of the nose to the insertion of the tail. Indeed, that which is now in the tower is not so large, being, as well as I could measure, six feet from the tip to the insertion, and the tail was three feet more. Like all the rest of its kind, its motions are irregular and desultory; it bounds rather than runs; and like them rather chooses to take its prey by surprise than to be at the trouble of hunting it down." How large a leap it can take at once we may easily judge, by comparing what it might do to what we see so small an animal as the cat actually perform. The cat can leap several

66

HABITS, LURKING.-A large proportion of the soil of India is of a reddish hue, and the grass during the summer heats being deprived of the sap proper to create a verdure, becomes of a dusky colour, very similar to the brighter parts of a tiger's coat. These circumstances are peculiarly favourable to the animal's concealment; so much so, that a tiger is often roused where there does not exist any cover adequate to sheltering half his bulk: the colour of the animal so perfectly corresponding with the surrounding objects, as to conceal the danger.-ORIENTAL FIELD SPORTS.

son,

+ STRENGTH OF THE TIGER.-A tiger will convey a man with as much ease, whom he has killed, as a cat will a rat. "I once witnessed an instance," says Captain William"which gave me a very complete idea of a tigers proceedings, and of his powers. I was travelling post in my palankeen, through the Ramghur district, which is mountainous and little cultivated, being for the most part in a state of nature and abounding in jungles, when a bangy-wollak, who conveyed two baskets of linen and refreshments, and who preceded the palankeen about a hundred and fifty yards, set down his load, and seated himself on the side of the road to rest awhile. About two yards behind him vas a small bush, not much larger than a good sized currant tree, round which a small

quantity of jungle grass was growing. There was not another twig to be seen for at least half a mile, on that side of the road. No sooner had the poor fellow seated himself, than a tiger sprang from behind, or rather from within the bush, and after giving the fatal blow with his paw, seized the man by the shoulder and dragged him off, with the utmost ease, at a round pace, into a thick cover which had formerly skirted the road, but which had been cut away to the distance of about one hundred yards, for the safety of travellers."-ORIENTAL FIELD SPORTS.

TIGER'S PAW.-The tiger's fore paw is the invariable engine of destruction. Most persons imagine that if a tiger were deprived of his claws and teeth, he would be rendered harmless; but this is a gross error. The weight of the limb is the real cause of the mischief; for the talons are rarely extended when a tiger seizes. The operation is similar to that of a hammer; the tiger raising his paw, and bringing it down with such force, as not only to stun a common sized bullock, or buffalo, but often crushing the bones of the skull. I have seen many men and oxen killed by tigers, in most of which the mark of the claw could not be seen; and where scratches did appear, they were obviously the effect of chance, from the paw sliding downward.-ORIENTAL FIELD SPORTS.