Tantanoola Tiger 1893 page 3

TO THE EDITOR.

Sir—l confess to feeling intensely interested in the evidence you have from time to time given to your readers respecting the existence of an animal of the tiger species in the neighborhood of Tantanoola, an interest doubtless due to the fact that from 1860 to 1864, while engaged as superintendent of a Government road-making party, I had unlimited opportunities of destroying hyenas and leopards on the southern heights of the Tugela River, where these vermin abounded to an extent that would hardly be credited by anyone who has not penetrated the wilder parts of South Africa. Generally my object was effected by the use of strychnine, and certainly my efforts met with a wonderful degree of success; for whereas at my advent in that region it was almost impossible to converse by reason of the hideous nightly concert kept up all around us, in less than six months the performers were thoroughly silenced, and I earned the grateful thanks of the few farmers who dwelt on the banks of the Impafana and Umvoti rivers.

When leopards partook of my poisoned bait I always had the satisfaction of obtaining the carcase of the victim, and that within a hundred yards or so of the spot where I had set the alluring meat, but in the case of the hyenas I only once found the body of the marauder, though I know well enough hundreds must have died from the effects of the poison. This remarkable fact I attribute to the hyena being possessed of a stronger stomach than that inherited by members of the feline race, and I concluded that the hyenas had been able to get to their burrows before yielding up the ghost.

When we found it impossible to get the hyenas' carcases we determined to resort to trapping alive what few of them remained in the locality. We constructed our wolf kennel in the most approved fashion employed by the Dutch Boers, but for a whole month met with no success. Concluding, therefore, that we had cleared the place entirely of these ugly quadrupeds we shifted camp to the northern side of the Tugela, to a spot contiguous to Matyran's Hill, a, tract of country at that time inhabited by the people of the famous Langalibalele, a chief, who was shortly afterwards outlawed by the Natal Government for contumacity and murder of some native police men.

Here our trap was once more set up and, though the wild animals of the carnivorous sort were scanty, we now and then got some glorious fun out of such of them as were made captive. When it became known around the country thereabouts that we had got a live hyena prisoner the young Boers would ride to our camp from long distances to amuse them selves with the pastime of trying which could hold the brute the longest period by the ears. In this sport none could vie with the herculean giant, Hermanus van Rooyen, the biggest and strongest man I have ever met with. When be took hold of a hyena's ears the animal could not get away at all, and no wonder either, for I have seen him take a sturdy Zulu ox by the horns and turn him over on his back by main strength. This same Hermanus acquainted us with several other clever devices for entrapping wild animals, and illustrated to us the different methods employed for the capture of leopards by the Zulu and Amaswazi huntsmen.

But what I deem of most importance to the people of Tantanoola is the ingenious expedient resorted to for inducing any carnivorous animal to come from a considerable distance and get snared. And this style of warfare against the supposed tiger of Tantanoola must commend itself as being entirely a safe one. I would emphatically warn the young men of that neighborhood of the danger attending a hunt for the animal unless the party be accompanied by a large number of serviceable dogs, as without the latter some of the men will be almost sure to fall a sacrifice, and yet the animal perchance escape, giving a very serious lesson to its would-be destroyers.

Judging from the description given by Mr. E. T. White, the beast is none other than a Bengal tiger, generally called a royal tiger, and the largest to be found in the whole world. It is not to be wondered at that Mr. White did nothing about having seen such a tiger "for fear of being laughed at." Many other very sensible people would observe a similar reticence.

By the way, I entirely disapprove of the suggestion that the very thick ti-tree in the locality where it is supposed the tiger has his lair should be cut, because people will be safer from molestation it the animal has a place of adequate shelter to retire to. Deprive him of this and he will probably soon develop into a maneater. Give him his bit of jungle and he will only scare somebody now and then and be glad to be left alone. True it is, however, that so long as he is known to be there people must feel uneasy, if not positively alarmed.

In conclusion allow me to say that if some of the good folks of Tantanoola would extend an invitation to me to visit the district, defray my expenses, and place the services of a dozen active young men at my disposal, I would confidently undertake to render a satisfactory account of the justly-dreaded brute within a period of— let us say—a month.

I am, &c.,
D. F. MaCDONALD.
Flinders-street, Adelaide.