"It was pretty late before I fell asleep," resumed Colonel Eyre, setting down his tumbler, "and it was still dark when I awoke, or seemed to awake, with my wife's voice ringing in my ears--a shriek of agony that made me start up from my pillow and listen breathlessly. There was a lantern burning in my tent--I had left it so when I lay down--and by the glimmer of light I saw a large, dark mass spread itself between me and the canvas roof and gradually settle down on my head. I did not know what it was--it was vague and formless in outline--but I had a consciousness that it was something of a dangerous nature--something that threatened my life--and I struggled to throw myself to one side or the other. In vain. I could not move hand or foot. I lay as if chained to the bed, and still the dark mass descended, shutting out light and air and seeming to suffocate me." "Nightmare!" remarked Sir Alan. "Very possibly," returned the colonel. "Suddenly, just as I gave myself up for lost, and sank back on the pillow exhausted, I heard my wife's voice again, this time clear and articulate. 'Save yourself, Gerald,' it cried. 'Make one more effort for my sake.' I glanced up at the threatening outline, nerving myself for a final struggle. It was no longer formless; its approach had ceased to be slow. Swift as the swoop of a falcon it descended upon me--the immense body of a tiger on the spring--its cruel jaws agape, its enormous paws with every claw unsheathed, and its hot, fetid breath on my very brow!" "A decidedly uncomfortable dream," observed Jones. "Of course all this passed in one-tenth of the time I take to tell it. I rolled out from under the hungry jaws, and just as I reached the ground I heard the angry growl of the baffled monster, followed by a shattering roar loud enough to waken the Seven Sleepers. As my senses came back to me, I found myself lying half on the ground, half on my low camp bed, my body bathed in perspiration, and trembling in every limb. Just then my batman put his head inside the tent-flap and asked me if I had heard the roar, adding that there was a tiger in the camp. I pulled on my clothes, and I could hear the men walking about among the tents, searching and whispering--but no trace of a tiger could we discover." "Then it was a real tiger?" inquired Tom.