The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1901-05-27
HUNT FOR WILD BEASTS.
ZIG SID UGHTER OF MAN-KILLERS
is Planned FOE INDIA.
THE Greatest wild Beast Hunt Since
the World Began VIII soon be IDnu-
gurated by the Intan Empire.

England mas another war on Hanu
This time it is a war against the army
of the jungle, which is carrying devas-
tation and death into her Indian empire
Skirmishes with the Jungle people
have been going on for years, but now
England will take the field for a regular
campaign. So great has become the
number of human lives taken each yeai
by the wild beasts and venomous rep
tiles of India, and so many cattle are
destroyed annually by them, that the
government Is contemplating giving the
biggest hunting party the world ever
saw, a hunt that almost would cause
Nimrod, that mighty hunter before the
Lord to leave his rest on Shinar $
plain and join in the sport. In spite of
the constant hunting of tigers and other
wild beasts In India the tale of men
and animals killed each year has in
creased instead of diminished, and has
reached proportions which call loudly
for remedial measures.
An idea of the state of affairs may be
imagined from the fact that last year
the army of the jungle killed 27,5s7 peo-
pie and over 10000 head of cattle.
Man eating tigers killed 800 persons,
wolves killed 1898 persons, and leopards
1927 persons, while crocodiles and jackals
shared between them upward of eight
hundred. The number killed by snakes
was enormous no less than 24,621 per-
sons perishing from the bite of veno-
nous serpents. In return, the people
and the government Of India slew 100000
dangerous snakes and 10000 wild beasts.
But these killings of the Jungle peo-
ple' are not enough to check their TO-
rays upon the kings subjects and keep
down the loss of life and prosperity, 50
the government purposes to organize
great hunt, to which sportsmen from all
over the world will be invited to come
at government expense. Sections of the
country in which wild beasts most
abound will be hunted over by thou
sands Of keen sportsmen and the jun
giles beaten by thousands Of shikaris.
The destruction Of the poisonous
snakes is a more difficult matter to
deal with. A snake hunt does not pre-
sent the attractions of a tiger hunt,
and sportsmen hardly would gather
from the four corners of the world to
kill snakes. So, while the army of for
eigners which the government will have
in its service is fighting the beasts ma
tive army must be organized to seek
out and kill the reptiles, being melted
thereto by generous rewards. The rea-
son given for the unusually large num-
Der of people killed by snakes last year
is that the floods drove the reptiles
from the streams into the fields and viii
r-1o
beast.
When in 1877 tigers killed $40 people in
India, it was thought by the govern
ment that the limit had been reached,
and it was determined to check their
ravages and decrease their numbers by
offering rewards for every tiger head
brought in Although 1879 tigers We're
killed that year. the depredations of the
Jungle people" were not checked, but
kept increasing until they have reached
their present huge proportions The
tiger usually prefers as food cattle,
deer, wild hogs and peafowl, but if he
once gets a taste of human flesh moth
ng seems so palatable to him after
ward, and he becomes man-eater.
The confirmed man-eater is an old tiger
tIlQ lie oCClll5 W Mil llOl why w E,ietNll5
1s appetite, but from the very love of
killing. A single man-eating tiger is
Known to have killed 1903 persons in
hree years. Another killed an average I
If eighty persons year, and third .
,aused thirteen villages to be aban
loned and $50 square miles Of land to
,e thrown out of cultivation A fourth
Siled 1877 persons and caused public
Dad to be closed until the opportune
trivial Of an English sportsman, who at
asst killed the terror of the Jungle
The tiger is found in every part of
ndia from the slopes of the Himalayas
O the swamps of the Gauges Delta.
'hough rather given to frequenting
rassy plains and swamps, it is found
lso in forests, and it's favorite hunting
round, unless 1t is man-eater, is the
Of some old ruin. He
aunts deserted cities and crumbling
alaees-a striped monarch of desola-
ion, keeping the halls where forgotten
ngs once held their state. Nowhere
) the tiger so awe-inspiring as amid
hese ruins. In the jungle and on the
lain he is simply great and savage
east, but passing with his noseless
read down empty streets of long silent {
apitals, or pausing in shaft of moon ;
ght at the head of some great marble s
with the black shadows of the I
1ttering walls and fallen columns ~
round him. he is grand, majestic, the {
cry genius of the place.
A confirmed man-eater selects some {
illage, or maybe two or three neigh l
oring villages. for his field of opera c
ons There he lies in wait to steal the I
,raggy, under-fed domestic cattle for S
Is provender between meals" and to t
,ize his favorite food, men, women f
nd children, who stray too near the f
lge of the jungle. Sometimes the
licked old man-eater gets so bold and
s longing for human flesh so strong V
at he will venture at night into the v
reefs of the village for his victims, r
even into a hut, If he finds @
le with an open door a
The tiger is now found in the greatest I
imbers in the malarious country that i
inges the Hmalayas, in the jungles C
the central plateau and the dense v
rest which clothes the low swampy d
nds of the delta of the Gauges. The
an who first called this delta country h