Gulf Coast breeze., 1898-04-22
A DISAPPOINTED TIGER.
when He Jumped for Bather lie ie"
Into an Aiiigator's Jaws.

Into an Aiiigator's Jaws
Inst outside of an Indian village
there was a jheel, or ravme' lhls
ibeel was close to small river, trib-
utary of the Ganges; when the river
periodically oyerllowed its banks dur
ing the rains it became one with the
iheel. and on these occasions the denl-
aens of the river usually took 1t into
their several heads to ray casual
visit TO the jheel. Now, Que evening a
villager went to the jheel to have
wash. He entered into the lhecl right
up TO his neck and began, TO disport
himself like porpoiSe. Nova tiger,
having seen HIM thus engaged from
the top OF the hill on the same
side of the jheel began 10 stalk his
prey by stealthy creeps, Having
come to q right distance, the brute
gave leap towards his prey. But
alas! the tiger was no mathematician;
he evidently had neglected the study
of dynamics in his school days AT
al events, he failed to recognize the
fact that since his prey was much
lower than himself in relative altitude,
q leap OF the right strength for hori-
zoutal range would carry him beyond
his mark when there was an angle OF
depression; consequently he fell some
eight or ten feet on the other side OF
the bather,
Now, it happened that in the
meantime an alligator had also
seen the villagcr from the opposite
side OF the aforesaid Iheel and, think
ing that his dinner-time had arrived,
began to draw bee-line under water
towards the bather. When he thought
that he had almost come upon his prey
for he could not see very well under
water as it was SO muddy, he heard
great splash just il front, and think
ing it was a case of "now or never
las the bather might be intending that
splash for final gambol preparatory
to his departure, lie made a dnsh for
ward and brought his enormous jaws
down upon---the tigers p W
At first the bather nearly tainted
with fright when he saw the tiger fall
on the water. He could not, however,
understand for few moments why
the tiger did not turn round 20 devour
him. What was the meaning of this
strange, untigerike conduct? And
why on earth did the tiger persist III
keeping one Of his paws undec water
and beat the water savagely with the
other, uttering horrible growls al! the
time? Most mysterious of all, the
water began to turn red. Then all at
once, as the frantic assaults Of the
tiger became more furious and his
growls developed into roars, the huge
tail of an alligator reared up ont of
the water just in front of the tiger.
The bather realized The situation,
fed up the hill and climbed the near.
est tree. When he found hirrself
safe he had second desire to faint
away at the very thought of his mar
row escape, but on second thoughts he
determined with a strong effort to re.
tain his senses and see the whole busi-
ness through-of course, with the
laundable object of helping the COM
pletion of this truthful account.
The obvious intention of the alliga-
tor was to pull the tiger down under
water and drown the beast; so he
worked towards this sole end. The
tiger understood the benevolent pur-
pose, but tried to Illustrate the scheme
by beating the snout of the alligator
with his other paw, But, alas for
him! the said snout was we'll under
water, consequently he left much of
his force behind on the surface of the
water. At length his struggles be.
came feebler and feebler; then he dis.
appeared altogether from sight. New
York Sun.