Needless to say, we were filled with a raging thirst for the blood of this beast--Algy especially. He jawed, he bribed, he gesticulated, he held long conferences with the villagers, with Nuddoo the shikari--an active, leather-skinned man, with a cast in his left eye, who spoke English fluently, and wore a tiger charm. Algy accommodated himself to circumstances with astonishing facility. Most of the night we sat up in a machan, or platform in a tree, over a fat young buffalo, hoping to tempt the man-eater after dark. Subsequently Algy slept soundly on his native charpoy, breakfasted on milk and chuppatties, and sallied forth, gun on shoulder, to tramp miles over the surrounding country. He was indefatigable, and easily wore _me_ out. As I frankly explained, I could not burn the candle at both ends, and sit curled up in a tree till two o’clock in the morning, and then walk down game that self-same afternoon. He never seemed to tire, and he left the champagne and whisky to us, and shot on milk or cold cocoa. His newly acquired Spartan taste declined our imported dainties (tinned and otherwise), and professed to prefer, in deference to our surroundings, a purely vegetable diet. It was an odd fancy, which I made no effort to combat. Naturally there was more truffled turkey and _pâté de foie gras_ and boar’s head for _us_! Algy was a successful shot, and reaped the reward of his energy in respectable bags of black buck, hares, sand grouse, chickhira, bustard, peacock--no, though sorely tempted, he refrained from bagging the bird specially sacred to his hosts. Days and nights went by, and so far we were as unsuccessful as our forerunners. In spite of our fat and enticing young buffalo, whom we sometimes sat over from sunset until the pale wintry dawn glimmered along the horizon, we never caught one glimpse of the object of our expedition. Algy was restless, Nuddoo at his wits’ end, whilst Jones had given up the quest as a bad job! One evening we all gathered round the big fire in the village “chowk” (for the nights were chilly), having a “bukh” with the elders, and, being encompassed by a closely investing audience of the entire population--including, of course, infants in arms--our principal topic was the brute that had so successfully eluded us. “He will never be caught save by one bait,” remarked a venerable man, wagging his long white beard. “And what is that, O my father?” I asked. “A man or a woman,” was the startling reply; “and those we cannot give.”