Part 10

Omar and Munshee assisted in the work of loading the crates on the steamer, because they felt that their obligation to me did not end until we had the animals clear of Borneo. I felt, of course, that I was under obligation to them for all the fine work they and their people had done for me, and I wanted them to accept some money for their services. They refused at first but finally they gave in. From their point of view, they had made sufficient profit, merely in prestige, both with their own people and with the Resident. I made them my agents in their districts and took them with me to the offices of the steamship company while I arranged to have any animals they brought to Pontianak shipped to me at Singapore. When we sailed the next day, they were in their boats alongside, waving and yelling.

There was great excitement in Singapore when the story of the orang-outangs got about. Hordes of people came to see them unloaded. I called upon the police to keep the crowd back, for I was afraid the excitement might be too much for the beasts.

At my animal house, I put them in a quiet spot and left Ali in charge with strict orders against letting too many people come to see them. Then I went to the cable office and sent to the Antwerp Zoölogical Gardens news of the capture.

There was no question in my mind as to what the answer to my cablegram would be, and, before it arrived, I made all the arrangements for shipping. Antwerp offered $10,000 each for the animals delivered. I knew that I could get offers of $25,000 or more in the United States, but that the orangs would not be able to stand the voyage. I sent another message to Antwerp, saying that I was sailing and requesting that arrangements be made for shipping by rail from Marseilles.

A few days later, the cages were swung aboard and we started eastward. Ali accompanied me to care for the animals.

From the moment the steamer headed out to sea, the orang-outangs began to fail. They became deathly seasick, especially the female, and refused food. Ali and I were with them constantly, tempting their appetites with choice bits of food and doing everything possible to make them comfortable. The male grew better but the female lost strength rapidly. Finally she slumped down to the floor of the cage, unable to sit up; she paid no attention to us when we reached into the cage and touched her.

One morning she curled up on the floor, buried her face in her arms and died. Through her death I lost a great deal of money, but I could not help feeling relieved. She had been so abjectly miserable and she had seemed so human in her suffering! I have often wondered if the male had any idea that she was dead. He ceased to improve in health and he became morose. Many days of anxiety followed; every minute I expected the message that the poor fellow was dying.

The ship's carpenter built a vat, and we "pickled" the body of the female in salt water. I knew that some natural history museum would be glad to have such a specimen for mounting. We steamed into the harbor at Marseilles with the male still alive, and I thought that there was an even chance of getting him to Antwerp if the people there had followed my instructions and arranged transportation. An agent met me at the dock. Everything was prepared for us, and we lost no time in getting the beast to the train.

When we reached Antwerp, I felt like standing on the platform and whooping. My job was finished.

The men from the Gardens took charge and rushed the orang-outang out to the cage that had been built to receive him. We ran the transportation cage up to the door and cut away the bars. The orang-outang came out slowly, like a tired and sick old man. He was not interested in his new surroundings and he pushed away the food that we put before him. Veterinarians could do nothing for him. Ten days later he died.

Ali and I remained in Antwerp for several weeks. It was Ali's first trip to Europe, and not a very enjoyable one. He was bewildered and puzzled; he could not understand such a country. Only once did he venture out of the hotel without me, and then he did not go out of sight. He slept in my room on the floor--he would have nothing to do with a bed--and he would touch no food that was not vouched for by me.

When we boarded the boat that was to take us back to the Far East, Ali's face brightened. He had had a wonderful experience, but he said: "Oh, tûan, I am happy to go home: I would not live here."

VI

"KILLING A MAN-EATER"

Before describing my experience with a man-eating tiger, I want to tell something of their habits and the usual methods of hunting them.

There are three classes of tiger, the game killer, the cattle killer and the man-eater.

The game killer confines himself to heavy jungle amongst the hills, where he keeps to the feeding-grounds and resorts of game; he is a great killer of deer and wild pigs; he shuns the haunts of man and wanders in the jungle at all hours.

They are lighter and more active than the cattle killer. Doubtless the reason is that they have to travel farther for their food.

The terror inspired throughout a district by a man-eating tiger is extreme and the natives are only safe in numbers. The rapidity and certainty of its movements form the chief element of the terror it causes; it is generally an old tiger or tigress, or one that has been wounded or otherwise hurt, and has been unable to procure its food in its usual way.

Cattle-killing tigers frequent jungle close to villages and seize a victim amongst cattle where they graze, or pick up a stray animal about the villages at night.

The largest tigers are found amongst the habitual cattle killers. When a tiger becomes old and fat he usually settles down in some locality where beef and water are plentiful, and here he lives on amicable terms with the villages, killing a cow or bullock about once in four or five days.

A full grown, large tiger would have no chance in a fair fight with a bull-bison; the latter's brawny throat, with its hide one and a half inches thick, would afford him a difficult hold, even could he attain it, and no wrench could dislocate the bison's powerful neck, while the tiger would be crushed out of all recognition if once caught between the ground and the bison's massive forehead or forelegs.

I have never witnessed a tiger actually seize its prey, but it has been described to me by natives who have seen them many times while tending cattle. The general method is for the tiger to slink up under cover of bushes or long grass ahead of the cattle and to make a rush at the first cow or bullock that comes within five or six yards. The tiger does not "spring" upon his prey in the manner usually represented, but clutching the bullock's forequarters with his paws, one being generally over the shoulder, he seizes the throat in his jaws from underneath and turns it upwards and over, sometimes, springing to the far side in doing so to throw the bullock over and give the wrench which dislocates its neck.

The popular belief that a tiger can kill his prey by a stroke is erroneous. I have never seen anything to support this belief nor is it held by natives. I have seen several cattle severely lacerated which had escaped from tigers, where had a heavy blow accompanied the strokes of the paws, bones must have been broken.

There is no foundation for the belief in tigers sucking the blood of their victims; the jugular vein is seldom if ever injured; it is by the fracturing of the vertibræ, not by blood-letting, that the tiger's prey is deprived of life. In eating, the tiger invariably commences at the hindquarters and the exact spot where the first mouthful will be taken can be told with certainty.

The flesh of one or both thighs, and sometimes the flanks, or about fifty or sixty pounds of meat is eaten the first night.

Tigers seldom lie up far from their kill if the cover be thick and quiet; they eat whenever inclined either by day or night till the carcass is finished; this is usually on the third day; but of course, this depends upon the size of the animal killed. After or during a meal the tiger drinks largely, often walking belly deep into the water.

Tigers' power of enduring hunger and thirst is very great. Once we surrounded with nets a tiger, tigress and a leopard. We shot the leopard the first day, but the enclosed thicket was so dense that we could not get the tigers to show, but on the fifth day we wounded them both. After this, as nothing would make them break cover, I sent for elephants and killed them still full of vigor on the tenth day. The circle in which they were enclosed was about seventy yards in diameter, and the heat of the fires kept up night and day was considerable, yet they existed without a drop of water for ten days, suffering from wounds half the time. A tiger can go much longer than this without serious inconvenience. One of the most powerful elements in the tiger's attack is his voice. If the attack be commenced very near, the startling, coughing roar is almost paralyzing to the coolest, but if the tiger has to come on from any distance, he rarely does more than grunt, and the hunter's attention is concentrated on the beast itself, so the demonstration passes unnoticed.

The power of the tiger's voice at close quarters may be understood by anyone who has had an opportunity of seeing a newly caged tiger; it is almost impossible to watch the charge against the bars without flinching, if standing within a yard or so of them, but if seen at twenty yards distance it is nothing.

The tigress does not breed oftener than once in two years. They do not breed at any fixed season. Cubs have been taken in March, May and October.

A tigress feeds her cubs when very young with half-digested flesh which she disgorges on her return from hunting or kill. Carrying meat to any distance would be an unnatural proceeding, and the half-digested flesh is probably better adapted to the requirements of young cubs.

When only six weeks old the cubs move from place to place with their mother, but are left at home while she hunts, though she leads them to feast if near when she kills.

Watching for the return from a kill, or at a pool where they are known to drink, is a method of hunting chiefly practiced by natives. Poison pitfalls and traps are generally brought into play when dealing with a man-eater. There is perhaps no method of shooting tigers so seldom successful as watching for their return to feed on animals they have killed. For my part, I confess to a great liking for the silent and solitary watch, which kind of shooting requires the utmost vigilance and patience.

In a shady, green-screened platform in some fine tree, watching at the cool of evening, when jungle sounds alone break the stillness and birds and animals seldom seen at other times steal forth and can be watched at leisure, an intense excitement is kept alive by the possibility of the tiger's appearance at any moment. Those without experience at this game do well to pause, but one who knows the beast he has to deal with may kill many dangerous animals on foot without accident or even serious adventure. Almost every accident that occurs is directly traceable to ignorance or carelessness; the hunter is a tyro or over-venturesome, or due precautions are not observed when following a wounded beast on foot and moving about where he does not think the animal can possibly be, he is seized.

Tiger shooting on foot can never, of course, be safe sport; risks must be run, but if properly conducted, dangerous game shooting on foot is not the mad amusement usually supposed.

It makes all the difference in the world whether the animal to be attacked is wounded or not, and whether any tiger should be attacked on foot or left alone depends greatly on the nature of the jungle in which he is found.

In the grass plains and thick undergrowth in parts of the Malay Peninsula I have seen tigers that could only be shot at from the elevation of an elephant's back. None but the utterly ignorant would think of following a wounded tiger in the long grass or close cover where it has every advantage, and the hunter may be seized before he has time to use his rifle. In such cover the tiger rarely makes any demonstration, seeking only to avoid observation, but when almost stumbled upon he attacks like lightning.

Under no temptation should a hunter's last shot be fired at a retreating beast.

The really best time for tiger hunting in the Malay Peninsula is in the height of the hot season, July and August, when the water supply is at its lowest ebb. The tigers being very impatient of thirst, seek the lowest valley where much of the game he preys upon has gathered and where the village cattle are regularly watered.

It is quite useless to devote much time in hunting the hill or game killing tiger that preys upon game alone; they are so scattered over a large tract of jungle and so active and wary that it is only by accident that they are ever brought to bay.

The average size of a full-grown tiger is from eight and a half to nine feet from nose to tip of tail and weight from two hundred and seventy-five to three hundred and twenty-five pounds.

One day an old friend, Tungku S'leman, a petty rajah from Kelantan, then under the Siamese Protectorate but now under the British, called on me and invited me to go back with him to his district to trap or kill tigers, and he assured me I would be able to get some fine tiger cubs. I was in fact very anxious to secure a few good specimens of young tigers, but as his district was far inland, near the boundary line of a small state called "Rawang," I did not think it worth my while to go, for it would involve a lot of time, and knowing the Malays and their ways so well, it might mean that I would have to beat about the country on a wild goose chase. A Malay will always exaggerate, no matter on what subject, and, as stated elsewhere in my articles, they finally believe what they are telling. They will never do today what can be put off until tomorrow--"Nou-tee Bess-so" (wait tomorrow) is one of the principal words in their vocabulary.

As the Tung-ku's district was difficult to reach, the Kelantan river branching miles from the nearest point, and elephants being the only means of travel, I told him that if I decided to go back with him he would have to furnish the elephants and all the men I might need. I also pointed out to him the difficulty in transporting animals and cages to the coast, and that the cost in time to me would probably be greater than the trip and animals were worth. It was my policy not to show any interest.

I could see that the Tungku was anxious to have me return with him to his district, as it was tiger infested, and his people were leaving on that account. He agreed to do everything in his power as to men, elephants and transportation to the coast. I told him I was very busy but that I would think it over, and to come back in a few days when I would give him a definite answer.

As nearly all my animals had been shipped from my house in Orchard Road, I decided to take the trip with Tungku S'leman and go in for not only tigers but whatever it was possible to get. I was keen on securing a good specimen of rhinoceros, and tapir, so made my preparations for a lengthy stay in his district, and for getting whatever animals I could, large or small. When on the following day the Tungku came to see me and I told him I would go back with him, he seemed a happy man. I advised him to send his chief follower on ahead so that he could have the elephants meet us at the end of our trip down the Kelantan river, to take us inland, as that would save a lot of time and unnecessary waiting for them to come down for us. He assured me the elephants were there as they would remain until he returned. So the following week we started up the coast in a small vessel, and arriving at Koto Bharn, we went up by boat to the capital, Kelantan, and the next day after paying my respects to the Sultan, we started up the Kelantan river to where the river turned further south. Here at a kampong we found the four elephants of Tungku S'leman. We stopped four days at this kampong, getting everything packed that would not be used or wanted until we reached the Tungku's village, which meant a four days' journey through jungle.

Taking six men, including the headman, I started on a tour of inspection of that district for the best location to set up our traps, dig pits, and spread nets for smaller game, as the headman informed me that deer, wild pigs and tapir were numerous, but very shy. On our return to the kampong, I had a trap made and set up for the catching of tigers and leopards, and explained how the nets were to be made of rattan, both large and small mesh, and how to set them amongst the trees. I was particular to impress upon the headman that he was to remove all signs of the jungle being disturbed and if possible have a goat tied to the windward while setting up the large trap.

I did the same at the two other kampongs before we reached Tungku S'lamen's village, where I was received with interest by the natives, as I was one of the very few white people they had ever seen, and as the runners had hurried on ahead as we were getting close to his village, they were all out to see Man Gagah (Sir Elephant). After resting for a few days and hearing whatever news there was regarding the man-eater that was terrorizing the district, I thought it best to try and round him up by elephants.

As they are cowardly, as well as cunning, they are most difficult to stalk, and as their movements are so uncertain it is very difficult to locate them, it was essential that the men who were to work with me could be depended upon at the right moment. I assured them that in numbers they were safe from the tiger, and that by showing a bold front the tiger would be more afraid of them than they of it. The last time it had been reported had been about ten days before, and nothing could be done for the time being, so I started the men making traps, snares and nets. These I intended to set up within a certain area, while with others I started out on a tour of inspection with the elephants to visit all the water holes and drinking pools in the surrounding district. There I intended to have pits dug and to mark the best places for setting the nets; the traps I intended to set up later, depending more on the nets, as I had already had traps set up in the kampongs on our way to the Tungku's village. I spent a whole week in working out different areas for snaring by nets.

I had nets made of twisted rattan in sizes of twenty by fifteen feet with meshes six inches, other nets ten by eight and five by five feet with meshes according to what the net was best adapted for.

The older men who could not follow the hunt, I had put to work making transporting or rough string cages and crates, for monkeys as well as tigers.

My plan was to work each section or area and catch by either net or pit whatever we could. Everything was in readiness to start at daybreak the following morning, when a native came running into the kampong, crying as he ran, "Re-mow, Sa-tan" (Devil Tiger). The man was about to collapse with fright and exhaustion from running. I calmed him so he could tell his story, which was that while he, his wife and daughter were gathering some faggots not one hundred yards from his hut, the tiger suddenly sprang from the thicket and striking his daughter down, carried her off in the jungle. After leaving his wife in the hut, he ran to the Tungku's kampong to inform the Tungku what had happened.

As it was too late in the afternoon to do anything I told Tungku S'lamen to send out the alarm for all the available men; the alarm is sounded by the striking of a hollow log, which can be heard for miles in the stillness of the jungle, and all natives hearing the booming sound know its meaning. I advised Tungku to send five or six men back with the messenger and for them to stay with him until we came the next morning. The hunt was on, and all preparations were made at once for our early start, as the men began to flock in from the outlying kampong. They were to stay at the Tungku's kampong that night to be ready to start at daybreak after eating their breakfast. There was intense excitement throughout the whole night, very little sleep for anyone, for, as I told the men, they would not return until we had killed the tiger. A few of the natives, especially the headmen, had flintlock, muzzle-loading rifles. To these I handed out extra powder and slugs; they were really good marksmen and men who could be depended on at the right moment.

We started at daybreak. The men having eaten, everyone was anxious and eager to be off, now that the hunt was to be conducted not alone by a white man, but in numbers. There were fifty natives; the Tungku and two of his headmen with their flintlock rifles rode on the first elephant, while Ali and myself followed behind on the second, the third with stores bringing up the rear, for I had no idea when we would get back. Although the Tungku assured me the elephants were well broken, I did not place any reliance on them. Riding on an elephant and jogging along peacefully is one thing, and tiger hunting on the back of one is quite another. As I have mentioned elsewhere, they are excessively timid both in their wild and domestic state, and to become a well-trained, tiger-hunting elephant, one so broken must have plenty of courage and experience. It is simply madness to attempt to use an elephant that has never been broken and tried out, as they will always bolt. Then again, if one never had a gun fired from its back, the effect is rather startling to his riders. It is a terrible thing to be bolted with while on an elephant's back in the jungle. I intended to take no chances while mounted as far as shooting was concerned, depending on cornering the tiger, if possible, and if the ground were favorable, start on foot.

Besides my 50-110 express, I had a Holland double-barrel 450 and a Fox No. 12 smooth bore shotgun. Ali had his spears, but was to use either the express or double-barrel Holland if we came up with the tiger. The other men carrying spears, parangs and tom-toms made up the party. Arriving at the place where the girl had been seized, two men who were experienced trackers took up the trail, which was quite fresh and plain and could be easily followed. Presently we came upon the remains of the poor victim. Very little was left--only the head and upper part of her body. We stopped only long enough to bury the remains. The tracks were not over an hour old, and as the jungle was sparse, it would give no cover to the tiger. After crossing a small stream, his track led toward a rocky hill less than two miles distant, coming suddenly into a clearing with tall grass.