“When I first saw the beast he was moving stealthily along a little trail just across a shallow ravine.  I supposed, of course, that he was trying to locate the goat which was bleating loudly, but to my horror I saw that he was creeping upon two boys who had entered the ravine to cut grass.  The huge brute moved along lizard-fashion for a few yards and then cautiously lifted his head above the grass.  He was within easy springing distance when I raised my rifle, but instantly I realized that if I wounded the animal the boys would certainly meet a horrible death.

“Tigers are usually afraid of the human voice so instead of firing I stepped from the bushes, yelling and waving my arms.  The huge cat, crouched for a spring, drew back, wavered uncertainly for a moment, and then slowly slipped away into the grass.  The boys were saved but I had lost the opportunity I had sought for over a year.

“However, I had again seen the animal about which so many strange tales had been told.  The markings of the beast are strikingly beautiful.  The ground color is of a delicate shade of maltese, changing into light gray-blue on the underparts.  The stripes are well defined and like those of the ordinary yellow tiger.”

Before I left New York Mr. Caldwell had written me repeatedly urging me to stop at Futsing on the way to Yuen-nan to try with him for the blue tiger which was still in the neighborhood.  I was decidedly skeptical as to its being a distinct species, but nevertheless it was a most interesting animal and would certainly be well worth getting.

I believed then, and my opinion has since been strengthened, that it is a partially melanistic phase of the ordinary yellow tiger.  Black leopards are common in India and the Malay Peninsula and as only a single individual of the blue tiger has been reported the evidence hardly warrants the assumption that it represents a distinct species.

We hunted the animal for five weeks.  The brute ranged in the vicinity of two or three villages about seven miles apart, but was seen most frequently near Lung-tao.  He was as elusive as a will o’ the wisp, killing a dog or goat in one village and by the time we had hurried across the mountains appearing in another spot a few miles away, leaving a trail of terrified natives who flocked to our camp to recount his depredations.  He was in truth the “Great Invisible” and it seemed impossible that we should not get him sooner or later, but we never did.

Once we missed him by a hair’s breadth through sheer bad luck, and it was only by exercising almost superhuman restraint that we prevented ourselves from doing bodily harm to the three Chinese who ruined our hunt.  Every evening for a week we had faithfully taken a goat into the “Long Ravine,” for the blue tiger had been seen several times near this lair.  On the eighth afternoon we were in the “blind” at three o’clock as usual.  We had tied a goat to a tree nearby and her two kids were but a few feet away.