And yet, there are all kinds of problems. For instance, Indian weather
is so erratic that, while there may be water and cover and tigers one
season, all three will be absent the next. Further, there is marked
individuality among tigers. One will lie in water all day, and never
venture forth till the sun has sunk behind the western hills; another
prowls boldly by day. Some prey on forest beasts--chiefly the spotted
cheetah and sambur-stag; others, again, mark out domestic animals. And
last comes the tigress with clamorous cubs, who suddenly learns by
accident or impulse that man, hitherto so feared, is in reality the
easiest prey of all.

We had a front of eighty miles. Naturally we needed a big force; we
probably mustered three hundred, all told. Our base of operations was
a railroad-station twenty miles away, and we doubted at first whether
we could live on the country, for the terrified people had abandoned
all cultivation, and were living on bamboo-seeds and the fleshy
blossoms of the mahwa-tree. This was a serious question--this and our
transport. We had seventy-four elephants, and each ate seven hundred
pounds of green stuff or sugar-cane every day; and of camels,
bullocks, rude carts, and horses we had hundreds, to say nothing of
the dozens of buffaloes we carried as live bait for tigers. We should
need fodder by the ton, as well as sheep, fowl, goats, game, and milk;
grain, too, for the crowds of camp-followers; and canned foods and
medicines--including, not least, the store of carbolic acid for
possible tiger-bites and maulings. The water was to be boiled and
filtered, then treated with permanganate of potash. It was regular
army equipment, you see.

I went out myself with the _shikari_ scouts, inspecting jungle-paths,
dry river-beds, and muddy margins of pools. They pointed out to me the