2-981-897 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Royal Visit to India: the Prince of Wales's first tiger - second shot, from a sketch by one of our special artists, 1876. 'News of "a kill", as it is termed, was brought in...a tiger had killed a bullock in a ravine some five miles from Jeypore [Jaipur]...The Prince, the Maharajah, Lord A. Paget, Lord Aylesford, and Colonel Rose took their post...The tiger, roused from sleep, was seen creeping catlike...sometimes lost from view, till it came within less than thirty yards of the Prince, who fired. The tiger gave a leap and started off at a trot down the ravine. Again the Prince fired, and the tiger rolled over...The Prince fired twice, but still the beast went on, falling over a boulder out of sight. A beater...pointing to a cactus-bush, said, 'It lies there-dead.' The party descended and closed around the creature, tremendous still in death. It was a full-grown female, 8½ft. long'. From "Illustrated London News", 1876.