A Gentleman in the civil service of the British East India Company,
relates the following:
"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 twenty paces. The
elephants, however, are often dreadfully torn; and a large old tiger
clings too fast to be thus dealt with. In this case it often happens
that the elephant himself falls, from pain, or from the hope of rolling
on his enemy; and the people on his back are in very considerable danger
both from friends and foes. The scratch of a tiger is sometimes
venomous, as that of a cat is said to be. But this does not often
happen; and, in general, persons wounded by his teeth or claws, if not
killed outright, recover easily enough.
"I was at Jaffna, at the northern extremity of the Island of Ceylon, in
the beginning of the year 1819: when, one morning, my servant called me
an hour or two before my usual time, with, 'Master, master! people sent
for master's dogs--tiger in the town!' Now, my dogs chanced to be some
very degenerate specimens of a fine species, called the _Poligar_ dog,
which I should designate as a sort of wiry-haired grayhound, without
scent. I kept them to hunt jackals; but tigers are very different
things: by the way, there are no real tigers in Ceylon; but leopards and
panthers are always called so, and by ourselves as well as by the
natives. This turned out to be a panther. My gun chanced not to be put
together; and while my servant was doing it, the collector, and two
medical men, who had recently arrived, came to my door, the former armed
with a fowling-piece, and the latter with remarkably blunt hog-spears.
They insisted upon setting off without waiting for my gun, a proceeding
not much to my taste. The tiger (I must continue to call him so) had
taken refuge in a hut, the roof of which, as those of Ceylon huts in
general, spread to the ground like an umbrella; the only aperture into
it was a small door, about four feet high. The collector wanted to get
the tiger out at once. I begged to wait for my gun; but no--the
fowling-piece (loaded with ball, of course) and the two hog-spears were
quite enough. I got a hedge-stake, and awaited my fate, from very shame.
At this moment, to my great delight, there arrived from the fort an
English officer, two artillery-men, and a Malay captain; and a pretty
figure we should have cut without them, as the event will show. I was
now quite ready to attack, and my gun came a minute afterward. The whole
scene which follows took place within an enclosure, about twenty feet
square, formed, on three sides, by a strong fence of palmyra leaves, and
on the fourth by the hut. At the door of this the two artillery-men
planted themselves; and the Malay captain got on the top, to frighten
the tiger out, by worrying it--an easy operation, as the huts there are
covered with cocoa-nut leaves. One of the artillery-men wanted to go in
to the tiger, but we would not suffer it. At last the beast sprang; this
man received him on his bayonet, which he thrust apparently down his
throat, firing his piece at the same moment. The bayonet broke off
short, leaving less than three inches on the musket; the rest remained
in the animal, but was invisible to us: the shot probably went through
his cheek, for it certainly did not seriously injure him, as he
instantly rose upon his legs, with a loud roar, and placed his paws upon
the soldier's breast. At this moment, the animal appeared to me to about
reach the center of the man's face; but I had scarcely time to observe
this, when the tiger, stooping his head, seized the soldier's arm in his
mouth, turned him half round staggering, threw him over on his back,
and fell upon him. Our dread now was, that if we fired upon the tiger,
we might kill the man: for a moment there was a pause, when his comrade
attacked the beast exactly in the same manner as the gallant fellow
himself had done. He struck his bayonet into his head; the tiger rose at
him--he fired; and this time the ball took effect, and in the head. The
animal staggered backward, and we all poured in our fire. He still
kicked and writhed; when the gentlemen with the hog-spears advanced, and
fixed him, while the natives finished him, by beating him on the head
with hedge-stakes. The brave artillery-man was, after all, but slightly
hurt: he claimed the skin, which was very cheerfully given to him. There
was, however, a cry among the natives that the head should be cut off:
it was; and in so doing, the knife came directly across the bayonet. The
animal measured scarcely less than four feet from the root of the tail
to the muzzle There was no tradition of a tiger having been in Jaffna
before; indeed, this one must have either come a distance of almost
twenty miles, or have swam across an arm of the sea nearly two in
breadth; for Jaffna stands on a peninsula, on which there is no jungle
of any magnitude."