St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1891-07-22
STORY OF A TIGER.
Capt. Morse, Of the Alameda,
Recounts a Thrilling EX-
perience.
A Hideous Episode in the Ca
reer Of a Popular Cap
tain.
The Batting of a Tiger Trap
With a Wom-
an.
How the Pepper Trade Is Con-
Quoted and Tigers Caught
in Sumatra.
Did you ever hear about Capt. Morse's

said peculiar industry.
The tiger trade is one of the most
peculiar items of an Oriental sailors
profession, and. as Capt. Morse dabbled
long and deeply in the Indian ocean, he
naturally enough got mixed up in the
trade in living tigers.
Tigers are queer sort of merchan-
disc. You can't stow them in the hold
| like flour. neither can you hang them
on the yard arm; at lest if you do
| you cannot peddle them well. for the
market is awfully dull just now in the
matter of dead tigers, but. as he states
very naively, he will never do so again.
In those days Captain Morse was en-
gagged in the pepper trade between the
Sumatra coast and the Mediterranean.
| The pepper trade was pretty new in
| those days, and the honest Seamen had
| better chance TO make money than
| they have in these latter decades Of the
| nineteenth century.
You see," exclaimed the captain To
an Examiner man yesterday, 1--WE were
first to go to AnnabOlOO, and at Anna
! bOloO we used TO meet the boss rajah or
peppeTSeller. By right, | believe, a
raJah is sort of king; but we only re-
garded this particular rajah as the boss
pepperseller of the island. For he il
was that conducted the entire pepper
trade of SGmatra.
''lt was this way. you see. We used
to start out TO trade with about $4,000
in Mexican dollars, not to mention a
bOatIoad of blue dungoree, lead and
Turkey cloth. The Mexican dollar was
in those days the staple coin of the East
Indies. and next to them the articles Of
trade that were most fancied by the ma
ives were the dungoree cotton, the
Turkey cloth and lead.
Where the Profit Came In.
"Down in the roadsteads the raiah
took about One-half of what we paid for
the pepper. his officers took about a
quarter, and eventually. when all tolls.
ETC., were paid the original growers of
the article received about one-eighth of
what we paid for it. Now, there was
only about cent pound difference
between the price paid at Sumatra for
pepper and the price paid in the Medi-
terranean, and as our captain was ex-
pected to make about $4,000 voyage.
it was hard TO see where the profit came
in. But nothing could be simpler 10 a
far-seeing man." explained the captain,
land this Is how we did it,"
First We tinkered the scales. That
Is, we made one beam about half an
inch longer than the other. | used TO
do the weighing, and as we Slung the
beam over the bOugh of a tree, l always
had plug of white lead on one so as to
know where to hang the platform when
ii came to the day Of weighing. Then
we had very peculiar weightS-N eighis,
| ought TO say, that were particularly
peculiar. One of them-the boss weight
on the ship-Was a fifty-siX pound
weight, or. as the native and English
people called il. "A half-a-hundTed.'
This weight We invariably placed on
the short end of the beam when weigh
ing our Mexican dollars. and vice versa
when the trade was on our side OF the
bargain.
:Then, you see, it was one of those
big affairs with ring in the top for a
handle and that handle unscrewed. We
had chunk of wood under the ring
when we were weighing our own goods,
but when we were buying pepper we
had that vacant spot filled with shot.
That is what made the business
prOfitabie-the vacant spot filed with
shot.
81 was the boss weigher. you see.
There were four weighers altogether
the captain, myself and two natives.
My chief business was TO tell stories to
tbs native weighers and get their atten-
ton into other channels while the cap
tain monkeyed the scales. l did it
beautifully. The moment | learned a
language l could spin a yarn and then
we made money hand over fist.
Hannah Flesh for Bait.
Then you see the natives would
often smuggle pepper abroad in the
night TO avoid paving s. per cent tolls
on the gross receipts to the rajah and
his subsidiary pOtentates. They would
bring the pepper to the ship in boats,
and the prOtit-making was as easy as
rolling OF a log.
How did we do it, you say? Why,
we just got a cask and measured the
stuff. We would not let the natives
aboard, of course; but then we showed
them the cask. struck a bargain at so
much caSk. and that settled it.
How did we make money that way,
you ask?
why. nothing easier. Just knocked
two holes in the end of the barrel, let
the extra stuff run into the hold, and
that settled it. See?
But, to come TO the tiger.
Tigers are the devils own brutes.
and scarce even in Sumatra; but the
captain pinned for one.
"One night he told the local rajah
so. and the local rajGb, he said Hum. ,
and tina: meaps that settles it, Then
they sent village of men to catch the
tiger. They dug a pitfall for the brute.
and | went out TO see the fun. First
they put goat as bait. but the goat was
no good. Then they put woman.
Il never saw anything SO horrible in
my ifG- hrfr no 10
good for all it meant and the captain
wanted the tiger, | could raise no objec-
tons.
They tethered the woman 10 a stake
over the pitfall and left her there over
night. The sight sickened me and de-
cided TO rescue her. At about II O'Clock
| crept over TO where she was tied. in
tending to sever her bonds and release
her. Somehow or another she miSin-
terpreted my motives and shrieked at
my approach. and as she shrieked the
man IN the tree looking out for the tiger
came down TO prevent my interfering
with the business.
Bound i'm Tree,
HE sang out a sort OF an Australian
cOo-ee, only shrill one, and in two
minutes twenty men had surrounded
me, and Il rec minutes later L was
bound TO the upper branches of cocoa
nut tree with the lookout and waiting
to see the tiger.
About an hour later we hard a growl
in the jungle.
II was gagged and unable to shrek.
though l knew the grOwl came from a
tiger. A moment later the monster
leaped from bush, streaked and gleam-
ing in the moonlight. | could see his
yellow hide and the black stripes. l
could see the woman Quivering in ter
TOr. For maybe two minutes the ami
NAL maneuvred around, and all the time
the unfortunate woman was Shrieking
in an agony of fright. Then he
crouched back on his headquarters like
some gigantic cat and spTang on the un-
fortunate creature.
Il wanted 10 close my eyes. but some