Getting back into the tree with our guns, both of which contained heavy charges of buckshot, we quickly posted ourselves so as to improve the first opening for a fair aim. The tiger still crouched upon his rock of refuge, roaring close in the face of his enemy, yet hesitating to spring upon him; while the strong-necked old Jersey shook his curly head and fairly screamed at the yellow brute he was not quite able to reach. A bull’s voice in a rage is a strange mixture of frightful sounds, even more so than a tiger’s. We had our guns leveled, watching our opportunity. Presently the striped terror sprang up from his crouching posture, raising himself threateningly upon his hind feet, with his tawny breast fully exposed. Since then I have often seen an angry tiger rear himself in the same way against the bars of his cage. There could not have been a fairer mark for us, and both our guns spoke at once with a “bang!” Through the smoke we saw the great brute tip fairly over and fall upon his back. Then, convulsively, he bounded straight up from the rock two or three times, and at last, plunging forward, landed directly upon the bull’s horns. [Illustration: HIS HORNS PIERCED THE TAWNY SIDE] The next moment, heavy as he was, he was hurled ten feet in the air, and when he fell it was only to be tossed again. A dozen or twenty times he was thus thrown aloft, although after the first minute he was evidently as dead as he ever could be. After this the old Jersey appeared to enjoy much in pitching him along the ground to a considerable distance, following up the body as it fell, and sending it on before him as if it had weighed no more than a dead cat. We were glad to witness this performance, as it occupied the old fellow’s whole attention, and so gave us an opportunity to slip away unnoticed, which we very quickly did. No grass grew under our feet as we ran over the high ground between us and the house, which, as the plantation was quite large, was nearly a mile distant. With scarcely breath enough to relate our story, we told it, to the astonishment of Harold’s parents, whose thankfulness for our escape, when they had learned how narrow that escape had been, was inexpressible. It required a considerable force of men and boys to recover the body of the slain tiger in face of the bull’s threatening demonstrations; but it was nevertheless secured and brought home. It was then found, upon examination, that our charges of buckshot had undoubtedly done the business for the fierce brute, so that he must have been nearly dead when caught upon those stout horns. “A tiger in the State of Georgia,” said Uncle Hayward; “a true Bengal tiger! Well, I must own that I was wrong; I thought this morning it was only a silly story. Boys, you and the bull have done a great thing for the community!” “But, oh, the peril!” said Harold’s mother: “suppose we had known it at the moment! It was a double danger.”