Arthur: The Birthday Present Part II.

I ducked into a hollow under the overhanging fringe of lantana. In the shade I stood up.
Then I froze, I stood absolutely still…
Just a yard or so in front of me sprawled out in the cool shade lay a fully grown Bengal Tiger…

She stared at me. I stood rooted to the spot. With absolute terror I realised two things: her massive paws were just in front of me, she could so easily swat me like a fly; I had a gun but as I was painfully aware it was slung over my shoulder.
Not knowing what else to do I stood as still as I could. It seemed an age, but was probably only a few moments. Her huge yellow eyes stared unblinking into mine. Then she yawned, her huge mouth opening wide exposing her huge fangs. My heart jumped, but still I stood as motionless as I could.

Then slowly, almost casually she rose and stretched like the gigantic cat she was.
Again she fixed her eyes on mine before stepping forwards.
Then with her shoulder she pushed me almost gently, but still very forcefully aside as she slid from the shade out into the sunlit river bed.

I stood, not unmoving now because I was shaking like a leaf. Then after a moment I turned and ducked back into the sunlight. The tiger was almost at the opposite bank of the river, strolling towards the jungle.

I swung my gun off my shoulder and grabbed it awkwardly. Still shaking like crazy I brought it up, but probably because I was shaking so hard it discharged harmlessly into the air. The tiger picked up her pace and disappeared under the vegetation that covered the opposite bank.

I stood there watching the jungle she had disappeared into and sighed with relief. Relief because she had chosen not to harm me, but even more relief because my shot had gone wide and had not harmed her. I had brought up my gun without thinking, but as soon as I did I realised how wrong I would have been. For whatever reason she had chosen to spare me, it would have been very poor form to have repaid her with death.

I remained in India for more than another forty years. I went on many hunts, taking game of all kinds.

I should say of almost all kinds; I never hunted tigers after that day.
I decided that I had a debt to tigers that I would repay by sparing them, as she had spared me.

Arthur Russell contemplating a Madhya Pradesh Landscape 1965,
in forty years the area had gone from mostly jungle to predominantly farmland.
There are still Tigers in MP, but they are terribly endangered

Arthur: The Birthday Present.

The following is a story told to me by my Grandfather Arthur Russell. He told it to me a number of times when I was young. I know he also told it to my father Rupert when he was a child. Arthur was a real story teller and had an amazing ability to bring his experiences to life as he recounted them. This story is told essentially as he told it with little embellishment. The story is about an event that happened in the dry season in 1925. The location was near his family’s hunting lodge which was situated close to a tributary of the Narmada River not far from Jabalpur in what was then Central Provinces and is now Madhya Pradesh.

My father gave me a brand new 20 gauge gun for my sixteenth birthday. As was normal for the time in British India we were a family of hunters. Our house in Jabalpur and our lodge were festooned with trophies. If you have been to my brother Bill’s house you will have seen many of the trophies from those times.
Naturally I was very excited and wanted to try my new gun out as soon as possible. But although I was home from boarding school on holiday I had work to do before my father would let me out.

It was close to noon by the time I was out. It was very hot, as is normal in the dry-season and in reality if I wanted to find something to shoot I would have been wiser to have waited until it cooled a little in the evening.
But I was young and keen, so I ignored what I knew and hurried out as soon as I was allowed.

I headed down to the river because it was the usual way we threaded our way into the thick jungle. Because it was the dry season the river had stopped flowing leaving large standing pools in its sandy bed. I weaved my way along the river bed, leaving a trail of footprints in the dry sand.
As I went, I looked for tracks in the river bed as my father had taught me. Half an hour went by, I had seen nothing and the jungle was quiet except for the throb of cicadas high in the trees. My pulse quickened with excitement as I saw the pug marks of a leopard, but then I realised they were days old. I walked on.

The scenery was beautiful, the thick jungle on either side, and lantana thickets shading the banks of the river. The sun threw dancing reflections off the pools of water.
It was terribly hot, even for a boy who had lived his whole life in India. My gun began to get heavy so I slung it by its leather sling over my shoulder.
But I was not going to give up, so I went on.

Eventually, hot and tired I came to a stop. I stood and thought about what to do. I really wanted to bag something with my new gun. But I finally had to admit I was not going to find anything along the river in the heat of the day. Perhaps, I thought, if I went into the jungle proper I might at least find a jungle fowl. Or if I was really lucky I might bag a peahen for dinner.

My decision made, I turned ninety degrees and made my way to what looked like a lower section of the bank under its canopy of lantana.
I ducked into a hollow under the overhanging fringe of lantana. In the shade I stood up.
Then I froze, I stood absolutely still…
Just a yard or so in front of me sprawled out in the cool shade lay a fully grown Bengal Tiger…

Image: Wikipedia, Wild tiger in Bandhavgarh National Park, Madhya Pradesh