member. Those carbines are just as good for short distances.'

The major too added his persuasions against their having rifles, though he gave no reasons for his opinions on the subject. With some difficulty they agreed to be armed with short cavalry carbines only, and to join Ram Sing and the beaters, who were to start almost at once, because they would have to make a long and weary circuit to get to the north of the lair without in any way disturbing his Majesty the Man-Eater. There seemed to Jack to be a spice of more real hunting in thus walking up the tiger, than in staying hid amongst huge rocks and prickly-pear clumps, as would be his father and Captain Muller, and he began to enter into the further details of the plan with gusto. Sam Muller also apparently acquiesced, but the other heard him as they went back to their tents (the punchayat had been held under some splendid mango trees) muttering under his breath that he was not to be done out of his sport, and would have a rifle whether or no.

'Now, my lads,' said Major Hawkins rather solemnly, when, after an early and light tiffin, they were about to start with the beaters, 'I want you to promise me one thing. Captain Muller quite agrees with me that it is necessary. I want you to give me your word that you will not leave the side of Ram Sing, and that you will not on any

account do anything that he tells you not to do. Will you promise me?'

'Certainly, sir,' said Sam, after a second's pause, and Certainly papa,' said Jack in chorus.

'Upon your honour?'

'Upon my honour!' said both in a breathJack looking bravely in his father's eyes as he uttered the words. Two minutes afterwards they were by the side of Ram Sing, marching straight away from the little camp on their devious circuit to surround the tiger's den.

'We are well out of that mess, major,' said Muller, sitting down to enjoy his cheroot (it would not be necessary for the two officers to start to take up their positions for a couple of hours or so yet); 'we are well out of it-those old carbines are safe not to hit a haystack at twenty yards if aimed at it, so there's no danger of the youngsters getting into mischief by irritating the brute if they should by any ill-chance come across him.'

'Yes, and I have every confidence in Ram Sing; he is much too knowing, as well as too fond of his own dusky skin, to put it in any danger; and now the lads have given their word of honour to stick close to him, I feel as comfortable as if they were both in Neemuch.'

The two old comrades fell to enjoying their manillas, and if they did have 'forty winks' afterwards, who could blame them as long as they were at their appointed posts in time?

IT was past two o'clock before Ram Sing got his men in order, and set them to beat the jungly scrub where the man-eater lay. They set to work with a will, yelling at the top of their shrill voices, abusing the tiger with the most awful terms of reproach they could think of or invent, calling on their dead fathers and mothers to help them to wake him up, reproaching him with all his thefts of cattle and raids on women and children, and at last working themselves up to such a pitch of unwonted courage as actually to defy the monster to get up and face them. They let off fireworks, whose smell alone was almost enough to knock any Englishman down, such was the vileness of their composition; they hammered away at the tom-toms, they screamed out unearthly snatches of Rajpoot war-songs, those who had matchlocks blazed away with them as fast as they could get the rickety pieces—some a century or more oldto explode; others fired off the half-worn-out muskets and carbines they had been provided with, to the great danger of their neighbours' lives -for bullets not being given them for fear of mis

chief, the natives craftily supplied their places with pebbles, hardened earth, or anything that came first to hand, and banged off the contents in most hap-hazard style. Altogether, they made row enough to frighten the wits out of any beast, tame or wild; and Sam Muller, who was as sharp as a needle in most things, soon saw that there was not the slightest chance of any tiger, no matter how ferocious, turning to face the horrid din advancing on him. Both the boys enjoyed the fun thoroughly, entering into it with all possible zest, and firing away as fast as they could load their carbines, with this difference from their native competitors, that the boys had ball-cartridge, while the latter had. none. They were placed, one on either side of Ram Sing, on the right flank of the line, a very little way in the jungle-in fact, no more so than was sufficient to keep them out of the swamp that lay between it and the nullah. The shikarhee had chosen this position, both for greater safety and because he from there could better direct his men (the scrub sank down towards a hollow in the centre), and keep them by signs more in a straight line.

By the time they had got about a quarter of the way into the heart of the jungle, Jack noticed that Sam, who was almost on the very outside of the line, there being only one or two natives beyond him, had given up firing, and, looking closer, saw in his

hands, instead of the short carbine, a long doublebarrelled rifle.

'Hulloa, Sam!' he said, passing to the other side of Ram Sing, 'what's that for? Where did you get the rifle ?’

'Took it from the governor's tent, of course,' was the reply; 'he'll never miss it, it's a spare one; and you don't suppose I'm going to be made such a molly-coddle of as to be fobbed, off with a rusty old blunderbox like that,' he laughed, as he pointed to his carbine in the hands of one of the natives who had carried the rifle for him concealed, and exchanged it when they were well at work.

'I mean to have a bang at the brute when he bolts,' he went on; and if you weren't a milksop, you'd do as I have done.'

'But I don't suppose you'll see him at all,' said Jack, after a moment's pause; 'I begin to think he'll never face all the row these fellows are making.'

'Of course he won't—who ever thought he would? But as soon as he stirs, I'll be off outside and have a shot at him, before he gets near the governors, from behind one of these rocks, and who knows but I may kill him? Anyway, it'll be safe enough, for he will never see me.'

'But your promise? You gave your word of honour you would not leave Ram Sing.'

'Oh, that be hanged! You don't suppose I

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