The method of shooting tiger from elephants undoubtedly gives the best sport. Seventeen miles from Buxa Fort the great forest ends abruptly. From its ragged edge, five miles above the town of Alipur Duar, the cultivated plains stretch away to the south, seamed with _nullahs_ which run from inside the jungle through the open fields. They are generally deep and filled with low trees and scrub, and as they contain water form ideal bases of operation for a tiger issuing from the forest to carry on war against herds of cattle in the villages. The striped thief can lie up within a few hundred yards of a farm and kill the cows when they come to drink. If disturbed, he can retreat up the _nullah_ to the shelter of the forest. Consequently the stretch of ground just outside the south border of the Terai Jungle is full of tigers. During a visit from our Colonel to Buxa for his annual inspection I received an invitation from Mr Ainslie, the Subdivisional Officer of Alipur Duar, to bring my elephants and join him in a beat for a cattle thief which was lying up in a _nullah_ three or four miles from the town. At that time I had only Khartoum and Dundora; as Jhansi had run away to the forest after being attacked by a wild elephant and had been missing for months. However, on our arrival, we found Ainslie had collected seven; so that we had nine altogether. This number was not a great one; but we hoped that it would suffice. Mrs Ainslie was to accompany us; for she was a great sportswoman and had shot five tigers herself, as well as various panthers, bears and bison. We started out in the early morning, crossed the railway line, forded a river--which each elephant carefully sounded with its trunk--and reached the _nullah_ in which the tiger was reported to be lurking. It was broad and dry, filled with scrub and low trees. Ainslie took the Colonel in his howdah; and Mrs Ainslie shared mine. Taking up our positions on the bank we sent the beater elephants half a mile further on to drive towards us. At a signal from Ainslie the beat began. The elephants formed line across the _nullah_ and advanced, forcing their way through the jungle. An occasional squeal from one of them when the _mahout_ struck it on the head for shirking a particularly thorny bit of scrub, the cries of the men and the crashing of the huge beasts through the jungle as they trampled down the undergrowth and broke off branches from the trees, made din enough to scare anything. It soon proved too much for the tiger's nerves. My _mahout_ had carelessly allowed his elephant to draw back from the edge of the steep bank. I saw a sudden flash of yellow as the tiger darted through the scrub along under the overhanging brink in such a way that he was sheltered from my rifle. But I shouted a warning to the others, who were posted farther down where the bank sloped less steeply. The Colonel fired and wounded the beast, which dashed up the