summaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
-rw-r--r--.gitattributes4
-rw-r--r--LICENSE.txt11
-rw-r--r--README.md2
-rw-r--r--old/62505-0.txt3310
-rw-r--r--old/62505-0.zipbin52998 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h.zipbin1487816 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/62505-h.htm4759
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/cover.jpgbin232318 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_bm01.jpgbin10188 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_frontis.jpgbin125877 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_p023.jpgbin172227 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_p043.jpgbin185413 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_p057.jpgbin190926 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_p077.jpgbin184616 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_p099.jpgbin167060 -> 0 bytes
-rw-r--r--old/62505-h/images/i_p119.jpgbin160787 -> 0 bytes
16 files changed, 17 insertions, 8069 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d7b82bc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.gitattributes
@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+*.txt text eol=lf
+*.htm text eol=lf
+*.html text eol=lf
+*.md text eol=lf
diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6312041
--- /dev/null
+++ b/LICENSE.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
+in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES.
+
+Procedures for determining public domain status are described in
+the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org.
+
+No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in
+jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize
+this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright
+status under the laws that apply to them.
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..cefa8a4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #62505 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/62505)
diff --git a/old/62505-0.txt b/old/62505-0.txt
deleted file mode 100644
index 2cd4db9..0000000
--- a/old/62505-0.txt
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,3310 +0,0 @@
-The Project Gutenberg EBook of Tamba, the Tame Tiger, by Richard Barnum
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-Title: Tamba, the Tame Tiger
- His Many Adventures
-
-Author: Richard Barnum
-
-Illustrator: Walter S. Rogers
-
-Release Date: June 28, 2020 [EBook #62505]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Donald Cummings and the Online Distributed
-Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: Tamba ran for what he thought was the doorway of a
-cave.]
-
-
-
-
- _Kneetime Animal Stories_
-
-
- TAMBA
- THE TAME TIGER
-
- HIS MANY ADVENTURES
-
-
- BY
- RICHARD BARNUM
-
- Author of “Squinty, the Comical Pig,” “Tum Tum,
- the Jolly Elephant,” “Chunky, the Happy Hippo,”
- “Sharp Eyes, the Silver Fox,” “Nero, the
- Circus Lion,” etc.
-
-
- _ILLUSTRATED BY
- WALTER S. ROGERS_
-
-
- NEW YORK
- BARSE & HOPKINS
- PUBLISHERS
-
-
-
-
-KNEETIME ANIMAL STORIES
-
-By Richard Barnum
-
-_Large 12mo. Illustrated._
-
-
- SQUINTY, THE COMICAL PIG.
- SLICKO, THE JUMPING SQUIRREL.
- MAPPO, THE MERRY MONKEY.
- TUM TUM, THE JOLLY ELEPHANT.
- DON, A RUNAWAY DOG.
- DIDO, THE DANCING BEAR.
- BLACKIE, A LOST CAT.
- FLOP EAR, THE FUNNY RABBIT.
- TINKLE, THE TRICK PONY.
- LIGHTFOOT, THE LEAPING GOAT.
- CHUNKY, THE HAPPY HIPPO.
- SHARP EYES, THE SILVER FOX.
- NERO, THE CIRCUS LION.
- TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER.
-
-
- BARSE & HOPKINS
- Publishers New York
-
-
- Copyright, 1919,
- by
- Barse & Hopkins
-
-
- _Tamba, the Tame Tiger_
-
-
- VAIL·BALLOU COMPANY
- BINGHAMTON AND NEW YORK
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS
-
-
- CHAPTER PAGE
- I TAMBA IS CROSS 7
- II TAMBA’S FUNNY TRICK 17
- III TAMBA PLAYS A JOKE 26
- IV TAMBA IN A WRECK 34
- V TAMBA IN A BARN 45
- VI TAMBA MEETS TINKLE 53
- VII TAMBA AND SQUINTY 65
- VIII TAMBA IN THE CITY 74
- IX TAMBA IN THE SUBWAY 84
- X TAMBA AT THE DOCK 95
- XI TAMBA ON THE SHIP 106
- XII TAMBA IN THE JUNGLE 113
-
-
-
-
-ILLUSTRATIONS
-
-
- Tamba ran for what he thought was the doorway of
- a cave _Frontispiece_
-
- PAGE
-
- And into his mouth it would go 22
-
- Off slid the tiger cage 42
-
- He dropped his basket 56
-
- The whitewash splashed out and splattered on the
- tame tiger 76
-
- But the man was asleep and did not see the tiger 98
-
- Tamba ran and soon he was on the Indian wharf 118
-
-
-
-
-TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I
-
-TAMBA IS CROSS
-
-
-“Here! Don’t you do that again, or I’ll scratch you!”
-
-“I didn’t do anything, Tamba.”
-
-“Yes, you did! You stuck your tail into my cage, and if you do it again
-I’ll step on it! Burr-r-r-r!”
-
-Tamba, the tame tiger, looked out between the iron bars of the big
-circus-wagon cage where he lived and glared at Nero, the lion who was
-next door to him. Their cages were close together in the circus tent,
-and Nero, pacing up and down in his, had, accidentally, let his long,
-tufted tail slip between the bars of the cage where Tamba was.
-
-“Take your tail out of my cage!” growled Tamba.
-
-“Oh, certainly! Of course I will!” said Nero, and though he could roar
-very loudly at times, he now spoke in a very gentle voice indeed; that
-is, for a lion. Of course both Tamba and Nero were talking in animal
-language, just as your dog and cat talk to one another, by mewing and
-barking.
-
-“My goodness!” rumbled Tum Tum, the jolly elephant of the circus, as he
-turned to speak to Chunky, the happy hippo, who was taking a bath in
-his tank of water near the camels. “My goodness! Tamba is very cross
-to-day. I wonder what the matter is with our tame tiger.”
-
-“He isn’t very tame just now,” said Dido, the dancing bear, who did
-funny tricks on top of a wooden platform strapped to Tum Tum’s back. “I
-call him rather wild!”
-
-“So he is; but don’t let him hear you say it,” whispered Tum Tum
-through his trunk. “It might make him all the crosser.”
-
-“Here! What’s that you’re saying about me?” suddenly asked Tamba. He
-came over to the side of his cage nearest Tum Tum. “I heard you talking
-about me,” went on the tame tiger, who was beautifully striped with
-yellow and black. “I heard you, and I don’t like it!”
-
-“Well, then you shouldn’t be so cross,” said Tum Tum. He was not at all
-afraid of Tamba, as some of the smaller circus animals――such as the
-monkeys and little Shetland ponies――were. “You spoke very unkindly to
-Nero just now,” went on Tum Tum. “And, really, if his tail did slip in
-between the bars of your cage, that didn’t hurt anything, did it?”
-
-Tamba, the tame tiger, sort of hung his head. He was a bit ashamed of
-himself, as he had good reason to be.
-
-“We ought to be kind to one another――we circus animals,” went on Tum
-Tum. “Here we are, a good way from our jungle homes, most of us. And
-though we like it here in the circus, still we can’t help but think,
-sometimes, of how we used to run about as we pleased in the woods and
-the fields. So we ought to be nice to each other here.”
-
-“Yes, that’s right,” agreed Tamba. “I’m sorry I was cross to you, Nero.
-You can put your tail in my cage as much as you want.”
-
-“I don’t want to!” growled the big lion. “My own cage is plenty good
-enough for me, thank you. I can switch my tail around in my own cage as
-much as I please.”
-
-“Oh, don’t talk that way,” said Tum Tum. “Now that Tamba has said he is
-sorry, Nero, you ought to be nice, too.”
-
-“Yes,” went on Tamba. “Come on, Nero. Put your tail in my cage. I won’t
-scratch it or step on it. I’m sorry I was cross. But really I am so
-homesick for my jungle, and my foot hurts me so, that I don’t know what
-I’m saying.”
-
-“Your foot hurts you!” exclaimed the big lion in surprise. “Why, I
-didn’t know that. I’m sorry! Did some one shoot you in your paw as I
-was once shot in the jungle? I didn’t hear any gun go off, except the
-make-believe ones the funny clown shoots.”
-
-“No, I am not shot in my foot,” answered Tamba. “But I ran a big sliver
-from the bottom of my cage in it, and it hurts like anything! I can
-hardly step on it.”
-
-“Poor Tamba! No wonder you’re cross!” said the lion, in a purring sort
-of voice, for lions and tigers can purr just as your cat can, only much
-more loudly, of course. “How did you get the sliver in your paw?” Nero
-went on.
-
-“Oh, I was jumping about in my cage, doing some of the new tricks my
-trainer is teaching me, and I jumped on the sharp piece of wood. I
-didn’t see the splinter sticking up, and now my paw is very sore,”
-replied Tamba.
-
-“Well, lick it well with your red tongue,” advised Nero. “That’s what
-I did when the hunter man in my jungle shot the bullet into my paw.
-Perhaps your foot will get better soon.”
-
-“Yes, I suppose it will,” admitted Tamba. “But then I want to go back
-to the jungle to live, and I can’t. I don’t like it in the circus any
-more. I want to go to the jungle.”
-
-“Well, I don’t believe you’ll ever get there,” said Nero. “Here you
-are in the circus, and here you must stay.”
-
-It was just after the afternoon performance in the circus tent, and the
-animals were resting or eating until it should be time for the evening
-entertainment. It was while they were waiting that Nero’s tail had
-slipped into Tamba’s cage and Tamba had become cross.
-
-But now the striped tiger was sorry he had acted so. He curled up
-in the corner of his cage and began to lick his sore paw, as Nero
-had told him to do. That is the only way animals have of doctoring
-themselves――that and letting water run on the sore place. And there was
-no running water in Tamba’s cage just then.
-
-“So our tame tiger wants to go back to his jungle, does he?” asked Tum
-Tum of Nero, when they saw that the striped animal had quieted down.
-
-“Yes, I guess he is getting homesick,” said Nero in a low voice, so
-Tamba would not hear him. “But his jungle is far, far away.”
-
-“Did Tamba live in the same jungle with you, Nero?” asked one of the
-monkeys who were jumping about in their cage.
-
-“Oh, no,” answered the big lion. “I came from Africa, and there are no
-tigers there. Tamba came from India. I’ve never been there, but I think
-the Indian jungle is almost as far away as mine is in Africa. Tamba
-will never get there. He had much better stay in the circus and be as
-happy as he can.”
-
-But Tamba did not think so, and, as he curled up in his cage, he looked
-at the iron bars and wondered if they would ever break so he could get
-out and run away.
-
-“For that’s what I’m going to do if ever I get the chance!” thought
-Tamba. “I’m going to run back to my jungle!”
-
-As he licked his sore paw, Tamba thought of his happy home in the
-Indian jungle. He had lived in a big stone cave, well hidden by trees,
-bushes and tangled vines. In the same cave were his father and mother
-and his brother and sister tigers. Tamba had been caught in a trap when
-a small tiger, and brought away from India in a ship. Then he had been
-put in a circus, where he had lived ever since.
-
-Just before the time for the evening show some of the animal men, or
-trainers, came into the tent where the cages of Tamba, Nero and the
-other jungle beasts were standing.
-
-“Something is the matter with Tamba,” said one of the keepers.
-
-“What do you mean?” asked the man who took care of Nero. “Did Tamba try
-to bite you or scratch you?”
-
-“No; but he isn’t acting right. He doesn’t do his tricks as well as
-he used to. I think something is the matter with one of his paws. I’m
-going to have a look to-morrow.”
-
-Of course Tamba did not understand what the circus men were saying. He
-knew a little man-talk, such as: “Get up on your stool!” “Stand on your
-hind legs!” “Jump through the hoop!”
-
-These were the things Tamba’s trainer said to him when he wanted the
-tame tiger to do his tricks. But, though Tamba did not know what the
-men were saying, he guessed that they were talking about him, for they
-stood in front of his cage and looked at him. One of the men――the one
-who put Tamba through his circus tricks――put out his hand and touched,
-gently enough, the sore paw of Tamba. The tiger sprang up and growled
-fiercely, though he did not try to claw his kind trainer.
-
-“There! See what I told you!” said the man. “That paw is sore, and
-that’s what makes Tamba so cross. I’ll have to get the doctor to look
-at him.”
-
-Tamba did not do his tricks at all well that evening in the circus
-tent, and no wonder. Every time he jumped on his sore paw, the one with
-the splinter in it, he felt a great pain. And when the time came for
-him to leap through a paper hoop, as some of the clowns leap when they
-are riding around the circus rings on the backs of horses, why, Tamba
-just wouldn’t do it! He turned away and curled up in the corner of his
-cage.
-
-“Oh, how I wish I were back in my Indian jungle!” thought poor, sick,
-lonesome Tamba.
-
-“Well, there’s no use trying to make that tiger do tricks to-night,”
-said the man who went in the cage with Tamba. “Something is wrong. I
-will look at his foot.”
-
-And that night, after the show was over, the animal doctor came to the
-tiger’s cage. They tied Tamba with ropes, so he could not scratch or
-bite, and they pulled his paw――the sore one――outside the bars.
-
-And then Tamba had an unhappy time. For suddenly he felt a very sharp
-pain in his paw. That was when the doctor cut out the splinter with a
-knife. Tamba howled and growled and whined. The pain was very bad, but
-pretty soon the men, who were as kind to him as they could be, put some
-salve on the sore place, took off the ropes and let Tamba curl up in
-the corner of his cage again.
-
-“Oh, how my foot hurts!” thought Tamba. “It is worse than before! I
-don’t like this circus at all! I’m going to break out and run away the
-first chance I get! I’m going back to my jungle!”
-
-Tamba did not know that now his paw would get well, since the splinter
-had been taken out.
-
-Night came. The circus began to move on toward the next town, and Tamba
-was tossed about in his cage. He could not sleep very much. But in a
-few days his paw was much better. During the time he was recovering he
-did not have to do any tricks. All he had to do was to stay in his cage
-and eat and sleep and let the boys and girls, and the grown folk, too,
-look at him when they came to the circus.
-
-But, all the while, Tamba was trying to think of a way to get loose
-and run back to his Indian jungle. And one night he thought he had his
-chance.
-
-The circus was going along a country road, from one town to another,
-and, as it was hot, the wooden sides of the animal cages had been left
-up, so Tamba, Nero and the other jungle beasts could look out at the
-stars. They were the same stars, some of them, that shone over the
-jungle.
-
-Suddenly there was a bright flash of light and a loud noise.
-
-“We are going to have a thunder storm,” said Nero, as he paced up and
-down in his moving cage.
-
-“It will be cooler after it, anyhow,” said Dido, the dancing bear. “It
-is very hot, now.”
-
-The lightning grew brighter and the thunder louder as the circus went
-up and down hill to the next town. Then, suddenly, it began to rain
-very hard. The roads became muddy and slippery, and the horses, pulling
-the heavy circus wagons, had all they could do not to let them slip.
-
-Suddenly there was a loud crash of thunder, right in the midst of the
-circus it seemed. The lions and the tigers roared and growled, and the
-elephants trumpeted, while men shouted and yelled. There was great
-excitement. What had happened was that a big tree, at the side of the
-road, had been struck by lightning. Some of the circus horses were so
-frightened that they started to run away, pulling the wild animal cages
-after them.
-
-Tamba felt his cage rushing along very fast. His horses, too, were
-running away. Then, all at once, there was a great crash, and Tamba
-felt his cage turning over. Next it was upside down. The tiger was
-thrown on his back.
-
-“Ha! Now is my chance to get away!” Tamba thought. “My cage will break
-open and I can get out! Now I can go back to my jungle!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II
-
-TAMBA’S FUNNY TRICK
-
-
-Bang! Crack! Crash! went the thunder, and the cage of Tamba, the tame
-tiger, as it slid along the slippery, muddy road, and struck a tree,
-made much the same noise, only not so loud.
-
-Tamba himself, inside the iron-barred cage, was feeling much better
-than when he had had the sliver in his paw. His foot was almost well
-now, and he could step on it, though he limped a little.
-
-“When my cage goes to smash I’ll slip out and run away,” thought Tamba.
-“I’m going to have lots of fun when I get back to my jungle.”
-
-Over and over rolled the cage, for the horses had broken loose from it
-and were running away. Many other of the circus animal cages were being
-broken in the storm.
-
-Tamba’s cage struck one tree, bounced away from that and hit another.
-Then it came to a stop, and Tamba, who had been rolling about inside,
-being sometimes on his head and sometimes on his feet, and again
-turning somersaults――Tamba, at last, found himself quiet.
-
-“Now is my chance to get away!” thought the tame tiger, who wanted to
-be wild again and live in a jungle. “Now I’ll get out of my cage!”
-
-He surely thought the big wagon with the iron bars on two sides――the
-cage in which he traveled――had been broken so he could get out. But
-when he tried, he found that this was not so. The tiger’s cage was
-broken a bit, here and there, but it was so strong that it had held
-together, and when Tamba tried to force his way out he could not. He
-was still a circus tiger, much as he wanted to go to the jungle.
-
-“Oh, this is too bad!” growled Tamba to himself, as he tried to break
-out, first through one side of the cage and then the other. “This is
-too bad! I thought, when the storm wrecked the circus, that I could get
-loose. Now I’ll have to wait for another time.”
-
-But if Tamba had not got out of his cage when the great storm came,
-some of the circus animals had. Nero, the circus lion, got loose, and
-he had many adventures before he was caught again, as I have told you
-in the book before this one. But Tamba had to stay in his cage.
-
-After a while, when the worst of the storm had passed, the circus men
-began going about, getting back on the road some of the cages, like
-that of Tamba, that had rolled downhill.
-
-“Tamba’s all right,” said a trainer, as he saw the tame tiger. “He
-didn’t get loose, I’m glad to say. I want to teach him some new, funny
-tricks, now that his paw is well again.”
-
-“No, Tamba didn’t get away,” remarked another man; “but Nero, the big
-lion, did. We’ll have to go out to hunt him.”
-
-When morning came, and the circus was once more in order――except for
-the broken cages and the animals that had gotten away――Tamba felt, more
-than ever, that he would like to be back in his jungle.
-
-“So Nero got away, did he?” thought the tame tiger, as he saw the
-lion’s broken cage, and noticed that Nero was no longer in it. “Well, I
-wish I were with him. Now he can go back to his jungle.”
-
-But Nero did not do that, as those of you know who have read the book
-about him. I’ll just say, right here, that Nero had many adventures,
-but, as this book is about Tamba, I must tell about him, and the
-adventures the tame tiger had.
-
-A few days after this, when the circus was traveling on again, though
-without Nero, who had not been caught, it came to a large city, where
-it was to stay nearly a week to give shows.
-
-“And now will be a good chance for me to teach Tamba some new and funny
-tricks,” said the animal man who had charge of the tiger. “I want him
-to make the people laugh when they come to the circus. The boys and
-girls will like to see Tamba do some funny tricks.”
-
-And the next day, his paw being again well, Tamba began to learn
-something new. When his trainer entered the cage, Tamba, much as he
-wanted to run away to the jungle, was glad to see the man. For the man
-was kind to the tiger, and patted him on the head, and gave him nice
-bits of meat to eat.
-
-“Now, Tamba,” said the trainer, speaking in a kind voice, “you are
-going to learn something new. Sit up!” he cried, and he held a little
-stick in front of Tamba.
-
-The tiger knew what this meant, as he had learned the trick some time
-before. When the trainer spoke that way he meant that Tamba was to sit
-up, just as your dog may do when you tell him to “beg.”
-
-“That’s very good,” said the man, when Tamba had done as he was told.
-“Now that is the first part of a new trick. Next I am going to put a
-little cracker on your nose. It isn’t really a cracker, it is a dog
-biscuit, and it has some meat in it. As you like meat I think you’ll
-like the dog biscuit.”
-
-As the man spoke he took from his pocket one of the square cakes called
-dog biscuit. I dare say you have often given them to your dog. The
-animal trainer broke off a bit of this biscuit and put it on Tamba’s
-nose. Tamba could smell that it was good to eat, and he quickly shook
-his head a little, jiggled the piece of biscuit to the floor of his
-cage, and the next minute the piece of biscuit was gone. Tamba had
-eaten it.
-
-“Well, that’s what I want you to do,” said the man with a laugh, “but
-not just that way. This is to be one of your new, funny tricks, but you
-didn’t do it just right. I want you to hold the piece of biscuit on
-your nose until I call ‘Toss!’ Then I want you to flip it into the air
-and catch the piece of biscuit in your mouth. Now we’ll try it again.”
-
-Tamba did the same thing he had done the first time, but the man was
-kind and patient, and, after many trials, Tamba at last understood what
-was wanted of him. He must hold the bit of dog biscuit on his nose
-until the man said he could eat it.
-
-Then the tiger was to give his head a little jerk. This would snap the
-bit of biscuit into the air, and, if Tamba opened his mouth at the
-right time, the biscuit would fall into it. That would be the funny
-trick.
-
-And, as I say, Tamba learned, after a while, how to do it just right.
-But it took nearly a week. At the end of that time his trainer could
-put a bit of dog biscuit on the tiger’s black nose. Then Tamba would
-sit up on his hind legs, very still and straight, looking at his master.
-
-“Now!” the man would suddenly call, and Tamba would jerk his head, up
-the piece of biscuit would fly, and into his mouth it would go.
-
-“That’s fine!” cried the man, after the second week, during which time
-Tamba had practiced very hard. “Now we are ready to do the new trick in
-the tent for the boys and girls.”
-
-And when the trick was done the boys and girls laughed very much and
-clapped their hands. They liked to see Tamba do his tricks. Nor was
-this the only new one he learned. His master taught him several others.
-
-Tamba would lie down and roll over when he was told; he would walk
-around on his hind legs, wearing a funny pointed cap; and he would turn
-a somersault, just as he had done the night his cage rolled downhill
-in the storm. All these tricks were much enjoyed by the boys and girls
-and by the men and women who came to the circus. Tamba was a very smart
-tiger. But, for all that, he never gave up the idea of running away
-when he got the chance, and going back to his jungle.
-
-All this while Nero, the circus lion, had not returned. He had been
-away since the night of the storm, and Tum Tum, and his other friends,
-missed Nero.
-
-[Illustration: And into his mouth it would go.]
-
-“But he is having a much better time than we are, just the same,” said
-Tamba, as he paced back and forth in his cage. “He is on the way back
-to the jungle!”
-
-If he could have seen Nero just then he never would have said that.
-For the circus lion was in the kitchen of a country farmhouse watching
-a tramp eat ham, and――but there! This book is about Tamba, not about
-Nero, though I have to mention the lion once in a while.
-
-About a week after Tamba had learned to do several new and funny
-tricks, there was a sudden noise at the entrance of the circus animal
-tent. It was after the afternoon show had ended, and not yet time for
-the evening performance.
-
-“What’s the matter, Tum Tum?” asked Tamba, who could not see very well
-from his cage. “What has happened? Have some more of our animals gotten
-away?”
-
-“I think not,” answered the big elephant, who could see the tent
-entrance. “I think they are bringing in a new lion. Maybe he is to take
-the place of Nero. We’ll soon know. Here they come with him.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III
-
-TAMBA PLAYS A JOKE
-
-
-Just as Tum Tum had said, a lion’s cage was being wheeled into the
-circus animal tent, and in the cage was a big, tawny, yellow animal,
-which Tamba knew, at once, was a lion.
-
-But, to the surprise of the tame tiger and his friends, it was not a
-new lion at all, but Nero himself. There he was, looking almost the
-same as when he had disappeared the night of the big storm, the night
-when Tamba thought he could get away.
-
-“Why, Nero!” exclaimed the tiger, as his friend’s new cage was wheeled
-in, “where in the world have you been?”
-
-“Oh, almost everywhere, I guess,” answered Nero. “I’ve had a lot of
-adventures!”
-
-“Ha! Then you’ll be put in a book,” said Tum Tum quickly. And, as those
-of you who have read the volume which comes just before this one know,
-Nero was put in a book.
-
-“Yes, I had adventures enough for a book,” went on the big lion, who
-had been caught by some circus men in a farmer’s woodshed and brought
-back to the show. “I had a pretty good time, too, while I was away,
-though I didn’t get as much to eat as we do here in the circus. I guess
-I’m glad to be back, my friends!” and he curled up in his cage and got
-ready to go to sleep.
-
-“Ho! Glad to get back, are you?” asked Tamba. “Well, I won’t say that
-if I get a chance to run away! I’ll stay, when I go!”
-
-“That’s what you think now,” said Nero. “But really it isn’t as much
-fun as you’d think――running away isn’t.”
-
-“Couldn’t you find your jungle?” asked Tamba.
-
-“No,” answered Nero, “I couldn’t.”
-
-“Well, I’ll find mine,” declared Tamba. “That’s why I want to run
-away――so I can get back to my jungle. And I’m going to do it, too!”
-
-Of course all this talk went on in animal language, and none of the
-circus helpers or the trainers could understand it. If they could, they
-might have guarded Tamba more closely.
-
-“Well, please don’t bother me now,” said Nero, as he curled his paws
-under his chin, just as your cat sometimes does when she goes to sleep.
-“I am going to have a nap after all my adventures and travels.”
-
-“All right, go to sleep,” said Tum Tum. “We won’t bother you, Nero.
-Only, some day, I hope you’ll tell us more of your adventures.”
-
-“I will,” promised Nero.
-
-Tamba, the tame tiger, paced up and down in his cage after Nero had
-gone to sleep.
-
-“I wish I had had his chances!” thought Tamba, as he looked over toward
-the sleeping Nero. “I wouldn’t have let them catch me! I’d have run on
-and on until I found my jungle, no matter how far away it was.”
-
-And then Tamba began to think of the life in India and of the days when
-he, a little tiger cub, was hiding in the deep, dark, green jungle. He
-thought of how he had tumbled about in the leaves, playing with his
-brother and sister, and of his mother sitting in the mouth, or front
-door, of the cave and watching her striped babies.
-
-They had learned how to walk, and how to jump and stick out their claws
-whenever they wanted to catch anything. Their father and mother had
-taught the little tiger cubs how to hunt in the jungle for the meat
-they had to eat. They could not go to the store and buy something when
-they were hungry. Tigers, and other wild animals, must hunt for what
-they eat.
-
-Of course, after he had been caught and sent to the circus, Tamba no
-longer had to hunt for his food. It was brought to him by the circus
-men, and thrust into his cage. Nor did he have to hunt for water, the
-way the jungle animals have to go sniffing and snuffing about in the
-forest to find a pool or a spring. Tamba’s water was brought to his
-cage in a tin pail, and very glad he was to get it.
-
-“But, for all that,” thought the tame tiger, as he paced up and down,
-“for all that I’d rather be loose and on my way back to the jungle
-instead of being cooped up here. Much as I like the things they give
-me to eat, I want to go home. And I’m going to get loose, too, and run
-away as Nero did. Only I won’t come back!”
-
-The more Tamba thought of the green jungle, so far away in India, the
-more sad, unhappy and discontented the tame tiger became. He did not do
-his tricks as well as he used to do, and he was often cross in speaking
-to the other circus animals. Sometimes he wouldn’t speak at all, but
-only growl, or maybe grumble deep down in his throat, and that isn’t
-talking at all.
-
-“I declare! I don’t know what’s the matter with Tamba,” said Tum Tum
-one day. “He doesn’t seem at all happy any more. Dido, do some of your
-funny dances and see if you can’t cheer up Tamba!”
-
-So the dancing bear did some of his tricks, capering about in his cage,
-but Tamba would hardly look at him. Some boys, though, who had come
-to the circus, gathered in front of the bear’s cage and laughed and
-laughed at his funny antics. They liked Dido. The boys liked to look at
-Tamba, also, but they were a little afraid of the big, striped tiger.
-
-One day, when the afternoon performance was over, and Tamba, Nero
-and the other animals who had done their tricks in the big tent were
-brought back to the smaller one, where they were kept between the times
-of the shows, Nero said:
-
-“Now I am going to lie down and sleep, and please don’t any one wake me
-up. I’m tired, for I did a new trick to-day, and it was very hard, and
-I want to rest so I can do better in the show to-night. So everybody
-let me alone.”
-
-“We will,” said Tum Tum, the jolly elephant.
-
-Now the lion is called the “King of Beasts,” and in the jungle he comes
-pretty near to being that, for all the other animals, except perhaps
-the elephant, are afraid of him.
-
-So when a lion says he wants a thing done, it generally is done. Of
-course Nero could not have got out of his circus cage to make the other
-animals do what he wanted them to do, but most of them made up their
-minds that they wouldn’t bother him, even though they knew he couldn’t
-hurt them. Nero was still “King” in a way.
-
-But that day Tamba was cross. Or perhaps I might say he felt as though
-he wanted to “cut up.” He wanted to play some tricks, make some
-excitement. He wanted to do something!
-
-I dare say you have seen your dog or cat act the same way. For days at
-a time they may be very quiet, eating and sleeping and doing only the
-things they do every day. And then, all at once, they will begin to
-race about and “cut up.” Your dog may run away with your cap, and, no
-matter how many times you call him, he’ll just caper about and bark, or
-perhaps pretend to come near you and then run off again. And your cat
-may dig her claws into the carpet, jump up on the window sill and knock
-down a plant or a flower vase, and do all sorts of things like that.
-
-Well, this is just the way Tamba felt that day. He wanted to do
-something, and when he saw Nero sleeping so quietly in his cage the
-tame tiger made up his mind to play a trick on the lion.
-
-“It isn’t fair that he should sleep so nicely when I have to stay
-awake!” grumbled Tamba. “He can dream of the good times he had when he
-ran away and had adventures, and all I can think of is how much I want
-to go back to my jungle! It isn’t fair! I’m going to make Nero wake up!
-I’ll play a trick on him!”
-
-Of course this wasn’t right for Tamba to do, but circus tigers don’t
-always do right any more than boys, girls, or other animals.
-
-Tamba’s cage was next to that of Nero, and close beside it, instead of
-being at one end. The cages were left that way when they were brought
-in from the larger performing tent, after the animals had done their
-tricks. So it happened that Tamba could look out through the bars of
-his cage in between the bars where Nero was kept. And Tamba could stick
-his paws out through the bars, but he could not quite reach over to the
-sleeping lion.
-
-“If I could reach him,” said Tamba to himself, “I’d tickle him and wake
-him up. I wouldn’t let him sleep!”
-
-But Tamba’s paws were not quite long enough to reach through the bars
-of the two cages. Again and again the tiger tried it, but he could not
-manage.
-
-Then Tamba sat down on his haunches and looked at the sleeping Nero. At
-last a tricky idea came to Tamba.
-
-“Ha!” exclaimed the tiger. “If I can’t reach him with my paws I can
-reach him with my tail! That’s what I’ll do! I’ll reach in between the
-bars with my long, slender tail, and I’ll tickle Nero on the nose!”
-
-Tamba sort of laughed to himself as he thought of this trick. And he
-had no sooner thought of it than he began to try it. He turned about,
-so his back was toward Nero. Standing thus, Tamba’s long, slender tail
-easily reached into Nero’s cage. Nearer and nearer the tip of Tamba’s
-tail came to the big black nose of the sleeping lion.
-
-Tamba looked sideways over his back to see where to put his tail. At
-last the fuzzy tip-end of it touched Nero’s nose and tickled it. The
-big lion twitched in his sleep, just as your cat does, if you lightly
-touch one of her ears.
-
-“Ha! I’ve found a good way to play a trick on Nero!” laughed Tamba.
-“I’ll keep on tickling him!”
-
-He waved his tail to and fro, Tamba did, and once again he let the tip
-of it touch Nero’s nose. The sleeping lion raised his paw, and brushed
-it over his face. He must have thought some bug was crawling on his
-nose.
-
-“Oh, this is lots of fun!” thought Tamba. So it was, for him. But was
-it fun for Nero?
-
-“Now for a good tickle!” thought Tamba, as, once again, he put his tail
-over toward the sleeping lion’s nose. And this time something was going
-to happen.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV
-
-TAMBA IN A WRECK
-
-
-Down on the black nose of the sleeping lion went the soft, fuzzy tip of
-Tamba’s tail. And Tamba tickled Nero so hard that the lion gave a big
-sneeze and awakened with a jump.
-
-Then Nero threw himself against the bars of his cage until they shook
-where they were fastened into the wood, and the lion roared in his
-loudest voice:
-
-“Where’s that fly? Where’s the tickling fly that wouldn’t let me sleep?
-If I catch that fly I’ll tickle him!” and Nero roared so loudly that
-the ground seemed to tremble, as it always does near a lion when he
-roars. I have often felt it in the zoölogical park where I sometimes go
-to look at the lions and the tigers.
-
-“Where’s that fly? Where’s that fly?” roared Nero. For you see he
-thought the tickling tip of Tamba’s tail was a fly on his nose.
-
-“What’s the matter here? What’s the trouble?” cried one of the circus
-men, as he ran into the animal tent, having heard Nero roar.
-
-“Are some of the lions or tigers trying to get loose?” asked another
-man.
-
-“No, it seems to be Nero,” replied the first. “What’s the matter, old
-boy?” he asked, as he saw how angry Nero was. For the lion was lashing
-his tail from side to side and roaring:
-
-“Where’s that fly? Where’s that fly?”
-
-Of course the circus men didn’t know exactly what Nero was saying,
-but they could tell he was angry, and they were afraid, if he bounded
-against the bars of his cage much more, he might break some.
-
-“I don’t see what makes Nero act that way,” said the man who had charge
-of the lion, and who had taught him to do tricks. “Once before he acted
-like this, but it was when a bee stung him on the nose.”
-
-“Maybe that is what happened this time,” said the second man.
-
-“I don’t see any bees flying around,” went on the lion’s keeper. Just
-then Tamba, seeing that he had awakened Nero, and had played all the
-tricks he wanted to, pulled his tail out from between the bars of the
-lion’s cage. And, just as he did so, the keeper saw him.
-
-“Oh, ho! I know what the matter was,” the man said. “The tiger tickled
-the lion. Tamba tickled Nero with his tail through the bars of the
-cage. That’s what made Nero angry. Tamba, you’re a bad, mischievous
-tiger!” and he shook his finger at the striped animal. Tamba walked
-over to the corner of his cage and curled up.
-
-“Well, I had some fun, anyhow!” he thought. “I waked Nero up all right!”
-
-And so he had. And now Nero knew what had happened, for Tum Tum, the
-jolly elephant, had seen it all, and Tum Tum said:
-
-“It wasn’t a fly on the end of your nose, Nero; it was the fuzzy tip of
-Tamba’s tail. I saw him tickle you!”
-
-“Oh, you did, did you?” cried Nero, and this time he did not roar. “Why
-did you tickle me, Tamba?”
-
-“Oh, I didn’t like to see you sleeping so nicely when I couldn’t sleep,
-because I’m thinking so much of the jungle,” answered the tiger.
-“Besides, it was only a joke. I wanted to see if I could make you think
-my tail was a fly on your nose. I did.”
-
-“Yes, you surely did,” admitted Nero. “I felt the tickle, even in my
-sleep. But if it was only a joke, Tamba, I won’t be angry. I like a
-joke as well as any one,” and Nero laughed in his lionish way. “But,
-after this, I’m going to sleep in the far corner of my cage, where your
-tail won’t reach me. A joke is all right, but sleep is better. Now it
-will be my turn to play a joke on you, Tamba.”
-
-“Yes,” said Dido, the dancing bear, “you want to look out for yourself,
-Tamba. A joke is a joke on both sides.”
-
-“Oh, well, I don’t care,” said Tamba, but he was not as jolly about it
-as he might have been.
-
-The circus men saw that something was wrong between Tamba and Nero, so
-they moved the cages farther apart, and then Nero and Tamba could not
-have reached each other if their tails had been twice as long. And then
-Nero went to sleep, and so did Tamba, waiting for the evening show to
-start. And as Tamba slept he dreamed of the Indian jungle, and wished
-he could go back there.
-
-And soon something wonderful was going to happen to him.
-
-That night in the big tent, which was bright with electric lights,
-Tamba did his tricks――catching a piece of dog biscuit off his nose,
-leaping through a paper hoop, and walking around on his hind legs. Nero
-also did his tricks, one of which was sitting up like a begging dog on
-a sort of stool like an overturned wash tub.
-
-And Dido, the dancing bear, did his funny tricks on the wooden
-platform, which was strapped on the back of Tum Tum, the jolly
-elephant. So the boys and the girls, and the big folks, too, who went
-to the circus had lots of fun watching the animals.
-
-But, all the while, Nero was watching for a chance to play a trick on
-Tamba. And at last he found a way. It was three or four days after
-Tamba had tickled Nero with the tail tip, and the circus had traveled
-on a railroad to a far-distant town.
-
-In the animal tent the lions, tigers, elephants, monkeys and ponies had
-been given their dinners and were being watered. Tamba was taking a
-long drink from his tin of water, and wishing it could be turned into a
-jungle spring, when, all of a sudden:
-
-Splash!
-
-A lot of water spurted up into his face, and some, getting into his
-nose, made him sneeze. Then he looked and saw that a bone, off which
-all the meat had been gnawed, had come in through the bars of his cage
-and had fallen into his water-pan. It was the falling of the dry bone
-into the water that had made it splash up.
-
-“Who did that? Who threw that bone at me?” growled Tamba. “Who made it
-splash water all over me?”
-
-“Oh, I guess I did that,” said Nero with a loud, rumbling lionish
-laugh. “I wanted to see if I could toss it from my cage into yours,
-Tamba, and I did. So the water splashed on you, did it?”
-
-“Yes, it did! You know it did!” growled Tamba. “It made me sneeze, too!”
-
-“Oh, did it?” asked Nero. “Well, that was just a little joke of mine,
-my tiger friend. I wanted to see if I could tickle your nose the way
-you tickled mine with your tail. It was only a joke, splashing water on
-your nose. Only a joke! Ha! Ha! Ha!”
-
-“Yes, it was only a joke!” said Tum Tum and all the other animals.
-“Only a joke, Tamba! Ha! Ha! Ha!”
-
-Of course the striped tiger had to laugh, too, for really he had not
-been hurt, and he must expect to have a joke played on him after he had
-played one on Nero.
-
-“Well, I’ll gnaw this bone after I take a drink,” said Tamba, as he
-dried his nose on his paw. “Much obliged to you for tossing it into my
-cage, Nero.”
-
-“Oh, you’re very welcome, I’m sure!” laughed the lion. “Oh, you did
-jump and sneeze in such a funny way, Tamba, when the water went up your
-nose!” and Nero laughed again, as he thought of it.
-
-And “Ha! Ha! Ha!” echoed Tum Tum.
-
-And so life went on for the circus animals, something a little
-different happening every day. Now and then Tamba played other tricks,
-and so did Nero, and the first crossness of Tamba seemed to wear off.
-He was still as anxious as ever to go to the jungle, but he did not
-see how he could get out of his cage. He watched carefully, every day,
-hoping that some time the man who came in to make him do his tricks
-would forget to fasten the door when he went out.
-
-“If he only left it open once,” thought Tamba, “I could slip out and
-run away. Then I’d go back to the jungle.”
-
-But the trainer never left the door open. Besides, it closed with a
-spring as soon as the man slipped out, and, quick as he was, Tamba
-could not have slipped out. However, he kept on the watch, always
-hoping that some day his chance would come.
-
-And it did. I’ll tell you all about it pretty soon.
-
-Sometimes, as I have told you, the circus went from town to town by the
-way of country roads, the horses pulling the big wagons with the tents
-on them and also the wagons in which the wild beasts were kept. It took
-eight or ten horses to pull some of the heavy wagons uphill.
-
-At other times the wagons would all be put on big railroad cars, and an
-engine would haul them over the shiny rails. This was when it was too
-far, from one town to the next, for the horses to pull the wagons, or
-for the elephants and camels to walk. For when the circus traveled by
-country road these big animals――the camels and elephants――always walked.
-
-And one night after a stormy day the circus wagons were loaded on the
-railroad cars for a long journey to the next city in which the show was
-to be given.
-
-“Well, you haven’t gone to your jungle yet, I see, Tamba,” said Tum
-Tum to the tiger. The big elephant was moving about, pushing the heavy
-wagons to and fro.
-
-“No, I haven’t gone yet,” sadly said the beautifully striped beast.
-“And, oh, how I wish I could get loose!”
-
-On through the night rumbled the long train of circus cars. There was
-no moon, and the stars did not shine. The night was very dark after the
-storm.
-
-Suddenly there were some loud whistles from the train engine.
-
-Toot! Toot! Toot! it went, and that meant there was danger. The
-engineer had seen danger ahead, but not in time to stop his train. One
-of the circus trains had run off the track and could not go on. It had
-come to a halt, and another train that was running not far behind the
-first one crashed into it.
-
-There was a terrible noise, a clanging of iron and a breaking of wood.
-The cars were smashed, and so were some of the animal cages.
-
-“What is it? What’s the matter? roared Nero.
-
-“We’re in a wreck!” trumpeted Tum Tum, the elephant, who was not quite
-so jolly, now. “The circus train is wrecked! I was in a wreck once
-before. It’s very bad! I hope none of our animal friends are hurt!”
-
-But some were, I am sorry to say, and so were some of the circus men.
-
-Tamba, the tame tiger, felt his cage slide off the flat car on which it
-had been fastened. The car was smashed and tossed to one side. Off slid
-the tiger’s cage, and then it fell down the railroad bank and into a
-ditch. Tamba’s cage broke open, and the tiger was cut and bruised, but
-he knew that he was free. He was no longer in the cage.
-
-“At last I am out!” he cried. “Now I can run away to my jungle! Now I
-am free!”
-
-[Illustration: Off slid the tiger cage.]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V
-
-TAMBA IN A BARN
-
-
-With the smashed circus cars, the broken animal cages, with some of
-the jungle beasts, including the elephants, cut and bruised, with
-shoutings, growlings, roarings and tootings going on, the scene at the
-circus train wreck was a terrible one. It was no wonder that Tamba, the
-tame tiger, wanted to run away from it all and get to a quiet place.
-And this he did.
-
-He crawled out of his cage, that had been broken when it slipped off
-the smashed car, and gave one last look at it in the darkness.
-
-“Good-by, old cage!” said Tamba, softly, as he turned to run away.
-“I’ve been in you for the last time. I’m never coming back to the
-circus!”
-
-Leaving the noise and confusion of the circus wreck behind him, Tamba
-slunk off into the tall grass that grew in the fields beside the
-railroad track. The accident had happened at a lonely place, and there
-were no houses near at hand.
-
-“Ha! This is a little like the jungle where I used to live!” thought
-Tamba, as he slunk through the tall grass. “I can hide here until I see
-which way to go to get back home.”
-
-And Tamba was right. The grass grew long, as it did in the jungle, but
-there were not so many trees and tangled vines as in India. Only at
-night it seemed a very quiet, restful place to the tiger who had been
-so shaken up in the wreck.
-
-Tamba walked on and on through the darkness, not really knowing, and
-not much caring, which way he went. All he wanted to do was to get away
-and hide, and the tall grass was just the place for this.
-
-In a little while Tamba came to a place where there was a small pool
-of water. It had leaked from a pipe that filled the tank where the
-railroad engines took their water. Tamba drank some, and then, finding
-a place where the grass was taller and thicker than any he had yet
-seen, he made himself a sort of nest and curled up in it.
-
-“I can sleep here, and Nero, that big lion, can’t splash any water into
-my nose and make me sneeze,” thought Tamba, as he snuggled up.
-
-At first he could not get to sleep. He had been too much frightened by
-the train wreck, though he was so far away now that he could not hear
-the din, which still kept up. But at last Tamba closed his eyes, and
-soon he was slumbering as peacefully as your cat sleeps before the
-fire.
-
-It was daylight when Tamba awakened, and, for a moment, he did not
-remember where he was. He stretched out first one big paw after another
-and then he called:
-
-“Well, Tum Tum, what sort of day is it going to be?”
-
-Tamba used to do this in the circus tent, for the jolly elephant was
-so big that he could look over the tops of the cages and tell whether
-or not the sun was going to shine. Most animals awaken before the sun
-comes up――just as it begins to get daylight, in fact.
-
-But Tum Tum did not answer Tamba this time. The jolly elephant was
-badly hurt in the railroad accident, but of course the tiger did not
-know this just yet. Tamba did know, however, that he had made a mistake.
-
-“Oh, I forgot!” he said to himself. “Tum Tum isn’t here! I’m not in the
-circus any more. I’m free, and I can go to my jungle. I must start at
-once!”
-
-Then Tamba arose, and stretched himself some more. He liked to feel the
-damp earth under his paws, and he liked the feeling of the dry grasses
-as they rubbed against his sides.
-
-“Why, I feel hungry!” suddenly said the tiger. “I wonder where I can
-get anything to eat in this, the beginning of the jungle.” You see,
-Tamba still thought the jungle was close at hand, but, to tell you the
-truth, it was far away, over the sea, and Tamba could not get to it
-except in a ship.
-
-The more Tamba thought about it the hungrier he became. He knew no men
-would come to him now with chunks of meat, as they had used to come in
-the circus.
-
-“I must hunt meat for myself, the same as I did when I lived in the
-jungle with my father and mother,” thought the tiger. “Well, I did it
-once, and I can do it again. I wonder what kind of meat I can find?”
-
-Tamba did not have to wonder very long, for he soon saw some big
-muskrats, and he made a meal off them.
-
-Then Tamba looked about him, and began to think of what he would do to
-get to the deeper part of the jungle――the part where the trees grew. He
-wanted to be in the thick, dark woods. All wild animals love the quiet
-darkness when they are not after something to eat.
-
-But it was now broad daylight, and Tamba knew he must be careful how
-he went about. Men could easily see him during the day. He remembered
-he had been told this in the jungle, years before, by his father. But
-in the jungle Tamba was not so easy to see as he was on this railroad
-meadow. The yellow and black stripes of a tiger’s skin are so like the
-patches of light and shadow that fall through the tangle of vines in
-a jungle, that often the hunters may be very close to one of the wild
-beasts and yet not see it. The tiger looks very much like the leaves
-and sunshine, mingled.
-
-“But I guess if I slink along and keep well down in the tall grass no
-one will see me,” thought Tamba. “That’s what I’ll do! I’ll keep hiding
-as long as I can until I get to my jungle. Then I’ll be all right.
-I’ll be very glad to see my father and mother again, and my sister and
-brother. The circus animals were all very nice, but still I like my own
-folks best.”
-
-So Tamba slunk along, going very softly through the tall grass. If you
-had been near the place you would probably have thought that it was
-only the wind blowing the reeds, so little noise did Tamba make. Tigers
-and such cat-like animals know how to go very softly.
-
-All at once, as Tamba was slinking along, he heard the sound of men’s
-voices talking. He knew them at once, though of course he could not
-tell what they were saying. Besides the voices of the men, he heard
-queer clinking-clanking sounds and the rattle of chains. Tamba knew
-what the rattle of chains meant――it meant that elephants were near at
-hand, for the circus elephants wear clanking chains on their legs,
-being made fast by them to stakes driven into the ground.
-
-“Ha! I had better look out,” thought Tamba. “Maybe those are the circus
-men after me.”
-
-The tame tiger was partly right and partly wrong. The voices he heard
-were those of the circus men, and the chains clanking were those on the
-legs of elephants. The men were trying to clear away what was left of
-the circus wreck. Tamba had taken the wrong path, and had walked right
-back to where he had started from.
-
-“This won’t do!” he said to himself. “I must get farther away and hide!”
-
-He peered between the tall grasses and dimly saw where the circus
-men were working along the railroad tracks, lifting up some of the
-overturned cars and cages. The elephants were helping, for they were
-very strong.
-
-“I’ll notice which way the sun is shining, and then I’ll know which way
-to go to keep away from the circus men,” thought Tamba. Then he turned
-straight about and ran off the other way.
-
-On and on, over the big stretch of meadows and lonely land near the
-railroad went the tiger until he had placed many miles between himself
-and the scene of the wreck. In all this time Tamba did not see any men,
-or any living creatures except some muskrats, many of which lived in
-the swamp along the railroad. The muskrats were not glad to see Tamba,
-for the tiger caught a number of them for food, but it could not be
-helped.
-
-No one saw Tamba sneaking along through the grass. If any one had seen
-him they would have hurried to tell the circus men, for a general alarm
-had been sent out, telling that some of the wild animals, including a
-big, striped tiger, had got loose after the wreck.
-
-But no one saw Tamba, and he saw no one, at least for a while. On and
-on he went until night came again. Then he found another snug place in
-among the dried grass where he curled up to sleep.
-
-“My jungle is farther away than I thought it was,” said Tamba to
-himself, as he awoke on the second morning of his freedom. “I must run
-along faster to get there more quickly.”
-
-After he had eaten and taken some water, he started off once again, and
-then began a series of very strange adventures for the tame tiger.
-
-Toward the close of the afternoon of the second day of his freedom
-Tamba stepped out of a little patch of woods, into which he had gone
-from the meadow, and there, in the light of the setting sun, the tiger
-saw a red, wooden building which he seemed to know.
-
-“Why, there’s a barn!” said Tamba to himself. “There’s a barn. I’ll
-go in there and stay for the night. I wonder if there are any other
-animals in it.”
-
-The reason Tamba knew this was a barn was because, when he had first
-joined the circus, he had been taken to a barn, and there was taught
-some tricks. The circus folk and the animals lived in a big barn
-instead of tents during the winter. So when Tamba saw this building he
-knew, at once, that it was a barn.
-
-Now it happened that this was a barn belonging to a farmer, who also
-owned a house near by, but which Tamba could not see on account of the
-trees. So, making sure that no one was about, Tamba walked toward the
-barn, and, one of the doors being open, in walked the tiger.
-
-He looked all around, as best he could, for it was not very light, and
-he sniffed and smelled the smell of animals.
-
-“Maybe some of my friends are here,” thought Tamba. “I’ll slink around
-and see.”
-
-So he walked softly and slinkingly to the middle of the barn floor, and
-peered about, and, right after that, a very strange thing happened.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI
-
-TAMBA MEETS TINKLE
-
-
-At first when he went into the barn through the door which was open,
-Tamba, the tame tiger, could not see very much. It was the same as when
-you go into a dark moving-picture theater from the bright sunshine
-outside.
-
-But, in a little while, Tamba’s eyes could see better, and he noticed
-some piles of hay and straw in the barn. That made him feel more at
-home.
-
-“This is just like the circus barn where I used to be before we started
-out with the tents,” thought Tamba to himself. “That is hay, which Tum
-Tum and the other elephants used to eat. I don’t like it myself. I like
-meat and milk. But I don’t see any elephants here.”
-
-And for a very good reason, as you know. Farmers don’t keep elephants
-and other circus animals in their barns.
-
-So Tamba looked about in the barn, and he sniffed and smelled with his
-black nose, hoping to smell something good to eat. But though there was
-an animal smell about the place (because there were cows and horses in
-the lower part of the barn) still Tamba did not want to eat any of
-them.
-
-If he had been in the jungle he might have felt like eating a cow, or,
-what is very much the same thing, a water buffalo. But since he had
-been in the circus he had been used to eating the same kind of meat
-that you see in butcher shops. So, though the tiger was quite hungry,
-and though there were cows and hay in the farmer’s barn, Tamba did not
-see much chance of getting a meal.
-
-“I’ll starve before I’ll eat hay,” he said. “It’s all right for
-elephants and horses and ponies, like the Shetland ponies we had in the
-circus, but hay is not good for tigers.”
-
-So Tamba walked farther into the barn, looking about and sniffing
-about, and then, all at once, he heard some one whistle. Tamba knew
-what a whistle was, for often his own trainer or the trainer of Nero
-would go about the circus tent whistling. So, when Tamba, in the barn,
-heard some one coming along whistling a merry tune he at once thought
-to himself:
-
-“Oh, perhaps that is one of the circus men coming to take me back to
-my cage in the tent! Well, I’m not going! I’m going to go back to my
-jungle, and not to the circus! I’ll just hide where they can’t find me!”
-
-Now the big pile of hay in the barn seemed the best place in the
-world for Tamba to hide in, and, as the whistling sounds came nearer
-and nearer, the tiger crept softly across the barn floor, and soon was
-snuggling down in the hay.
-
-“I remember once, when I lived in the jungle, I hid in a pile of dry
-grass just like this hay,” thought Tamba. “It was when I wanted to play
-a trick on my brother Bitie. I jumped out at him and scared him so he
-ran off with his tail between his legs. Maybe I can jump out and scare
-this circus man so he won’t want to take me back.”
-
-You see Tamba thought surely it was a circus man coming into the barn
-whistling. But it wasn’t at all. It was the boy who worked on the
-farm. His father had sent him to the barn to gather the eggs which the
-chickens had laid, and this boy, whose name was Tom, nearly always went
-about his chores whistling.
-
-“I hope I get a lot of eggs to-day,” said Tom, speaking aloud to
-himself, as he stopped whistling. “Maybe I can get a whole basket full.
-I’ll look in the hay for them. Hens like to lay their eggs in the hay.
-It’s a good place for them to hide.”
-
-Now, if that farmer boy had only known it, there was something else
-hidden in the hay besides hens’ eggs. There was Tamba, the tame tiger.
-Tamba had worked himself down into a regular nest in the dried grass,
-and only his eyes peered out. They were very bright and shining eyes,
-and they watched every move of the farmer boy.
-
-Tamba saw the basket which the boy carried in his hand so he might put
-the eggs in it, and, seeing this basket, the tame tiger thought to
-himself:
-
-“Well, if he expects to take me back to the circus in that little
-basket he’s very much mistaken. Why, it wouldn’t hold two of my paws!”
-
-And then Tamba took a second look, and he saw that the boy was not one
-of the circus keepers, as the tiger had at first supposed.
-
-“But he whistles just like one,” thought Tamba. “I wonder what he
-wants.”
-
-So the boy, not knowing anything about the tiger in the hay, walked
-right toward Tamba, hoping to gather eggs.
-
-In another moment, just as the boy began poking his hand down in the
-loose hay, hoping to find a hen’s nest full of eggs there, Tamba made
-up his mind it was time for him to do something.
-
-“I’ll give this fellow, whoever he is, a good scare!” said Tamba to
-himself. “I’ll teach him to come looking for me with a basket! Look out
-now, you whistling chap!” said Tamba to himself.
-
-[Illustration: He dropped his basket.]
-
-Then he gave a loud growl――one of his very loudest――and he raised
-himself from his nest in the hay, and stuck his head out.
-
-Now if you had gone hunting hens’ eggs in your father’s barn, and had,
-all of a sudden, seen a great, big, striped tiger jump out at you from
-the hay, giving a loud growl, I believe you would have done just what
-this boy did. And what he did was this.
-
-He dropped his basket, gave one look at Tamba in the hay, and then
-uttered such a yell that his father and mother in the farmhouse, quite
-a distance off, heard him. And then that boy ran out of the barn as
-fast as he could run. That’s what this boy did, and I think you would
-have done the same.
-
-“Well, I guess he won’t come back right away,” thought Tamba. “But
-there may be others like him. If I stay here I may have to scare a
-whole lot of them. I guess I’ll find a new hiding place.”
-
-So Tamba came out from his nest in the hay and began moving about in
-the barn, looking for a new place in which to snuggle, and perhaps find
-something to eat. And the first thing he knew he stepped right into a
-hen’s nest of eggs. Right down among the eggs Tamba put his paw.
-
-Of course he broke some of the eggs, but he took up his paw so quickly
-again that not many of the shells were cracked. And, as his paw was
-covered with the sticky whites and yellows of the eggs, Tamba began
-licking it with his tongue to make it clean.
-
-“Hum! These eggs taste as good as the ones I used to get in the
-jungle,” said the tiger to himself. “Guess I’ll eat them. I’m hungry,
-and they’ll be almost as good as meat.”
-
-So Tamba carefully cracked the egg shells and sucked out the whites and
-yellows. He ate a whole dozen of eggs before he finished, and then he
-felt better.
-
-“Now I’ll go and find a new place to hide,” he said to himself.
-
-He found a stairway leading from the upper part of the barn, where the
-hay was stored, to the lower part, where were the stables of the cows
-and horses. Down the stairs softly went Tamba, and no sooner was he
-down there than he felt right at home. For it smelled just like that
-part of the circus where the horses were kept. And, as a matter of
-fact, there were a number of horses in the barn, and quite a few cows.
-
-At first the horses were afraid of the tiger, and pulled at the straps
-which held them fast in their stalls. But Tamba, speaking in animal
-talk, said:
-
-“I am a tame tiger. I won’t hurt any of you. I only want to hide here
-so the circus men won’t find me. I am on my way back to the jungle. I
-have run away from the circus.”
-
-When Tamba spoke thus kindly the horses were no longer afraid. One of
-them said Tamba might hide in a pile of straw near his stall, and this
-the tiger was glad to do. He stretched out, and got ready to go to
-sleep.
-
-Now I must tell you a little about the farmer boy. When he saw the
-tiger rear up at him out of the hay, and ran away, screaming with fear,
-he did not know what to do. All he could yell was:
-
-“The tiger! The tiger! A big striped tiger is in our barn!”
-
-The boy’s father and mother heard him shouting and yelling, and they
-ran out of the house to see what the matter was. They saw that Tom was
-very much frightened indeed.
-
-“What is it?” they asked.
-
-“Oh,” Tom answered, “I went to get some eggs out of the hay, and I
-found a tiger there! He had great big eyes, big teeth and a big mouth!”
-
-“Oh, Tom! Really?” asked his mother.
-
-“Really and truly!” he answered. “You can go and look for yourself!”
-
-“No, I don’t believe I want to,” said Tom’s mother. “But do you really
-think he did see a tiger?” she asked her husband.
-
-“Well, I don’t know,” he slowly answered. “I read in the paper
-something about a circus train having been wrecked, and maybe a tiger
-or an elephant got loose and is roaming about.”
-
-“It’s a tiger――not an elephant――and he’s in our barn,” said Tom. “Come
-and see, Dad! But you’d better bring your gun!”
-
-“Yes,” agreed the farmer, “I think I had. And I’ll call some of the men
-to help hunt the tiger, too!”
-
-But, as it happened, by the time the farmer had called some neighbors
-in to help him and they had gotten their guns, Tamba had left the upper
-part of the barn, where the hay was, and had gone downstairs among the
-horses and cows. And as the farmer and his friends did not know this,
-and as none of the horses or cows called out to tell the men, they
-didn’t know where Tamba was.
-
-They looked in the hay, where the boy had seen him, but Tamba was gone.
-The men even found the place where Tamba had eaten the eggs, but the
-jungle circus beast was not in sight. He was well hidden downstairs in
-the straw near the stall of the kind horse.
-
-So the men hunted in vain, and some of them thought the tiger had gone
-back to the circus, while others thought he had run off to the woods,
-perhaps. At any rate, they did not find him in the barn, though he was
-there all the while they were searching. A wild animal sometimes knows
-better how to hide than you boys and girls do when you are playing
-games.
-
-And now I must tell you something that happened to Tamba, as he still
-hid in the lower part of the barn. He was snugly curled up in the straw
-when suddenly there was a patter of little hoofs on the floor, and a
-small pony trotted into his small stall, which was near that of the big
-horse, next to which Tamba was hiding.
-
-“Well, friends, here I am back!” cried the little pony. “I have been
-giving the boys and girls a ride, and now I’ve come back to have
-something to eat. Has anything happened while I was out, hitched to the
-basket cart, giving rides to the boys and girls? Has anything happened?”
-
-“Yes,” answered the old horse, near whose stall Tamba was hiding in the
-straw, “something strange has happened. A big striped animal, who calls
-himself a tiger, came into our barn.”
-
-“A tiger!” cried the little pony. “Why, I’d like to see him. I know
-something about tigers.”
-
-“Oh, do you?” asked Tamba himself, sticking his head out of the
-straw, as he had stuck it out of the hay at Tom. But the pony was not
-frightened. “So you know something about tigers, do you?” went on
-Tamba. “Well, what is your name, if I may ask? Mine is Tamba.”
-
-“Oh, ho! I know that very well!” neighed the pony. “You don’t know me,
-Tamba, but I have often seen you in the circus. I am Tinkle, the trick
-pony. I was in the circus a short time myself, but there were so many
-of us little Shetland ponies that I don’t suppose you remember me. But
-there were only a few tigers in the show, and I remember you very well.
-Didn’t you used to jump through a paper hoop as one of your tricks?”
-
-“Yes,” answered Tamba, “I did. And, now that you speak of it, I believe
-I remember you. You used to pull, around the ring, a little cart with a
-funny clown in it, didn’t you?”
-
-“Yes,” said Tinkle, “I did. Well, Tamba, I’m glad to see you again. But
-what brings you so far from the circus, and why are you hiding here?”
-
-“That,” said Tamba, “is a long story. I’ll tell it to you!”
-
-But, all of a sudden, one of the cows at the far end of the stable
-mooed out:
-
-“Quick, Tamba! Here comes the man to milk us! Hide in the straw so he
-won’t see you!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII
-
-TAMBA AND SQUINTY
-
-
-Tamba did not need to be told twice what to do. As soon as he heard the
-kind words of the cow the tame tiger ran softly on his padded feet and
-snuggled down again in the straw. And the man came in, milked the cows,
-and went out with the foaming pails without knowing anything about the
-circus tiger hiding in the lower part of the barn. He thought the tiger
-had gone away.
-
-“Now it’s all right――he’s gone and you may come out,” said the cow to
-Tamba, and the tiger, shaking the straw from his striped black and
-yellow fur, walked out to talk some more to Tinkle, the trick pony.
-
-“You were going to tell us how it was you left the circus, Tamba,” said
-Tinkle. “Make a good, long story of it. I like stories.”
-
-“I haven’t time to make it too long,” said Tamba, “for I must be on
-my way. I want to get back to my jungle. At first I thought the long
-grass near the railroad was the place I wanted. But I see it is not the
-jungle where I used to live. So I must travel on a long way, and the
-sooner I start the quicker I’ll be there. But I’ll tell you how I got
-loose from the circus.”
-
-So Tamba told Tinkle the story I have told you――how the circus was
-wrecked in the railroad accident, and how the cage burst open, letting
-the tame tiger loose.
-
-“And now I’m here,” finished Tamba. “But tell me, Tinkle, how did you
-come to leave the circus?”
-
-“Well, I had many adventures,” said the trick pony. “I used to live on
-a stockfarm, something like this, only there were more horses on it. I
-was taken away to live with a nice boy, who taught me many tricks, and
-then a bad man, with a big moving wagon, came along one day and stole
-me away. He sold me to the circus, and it was there I saw you, Tamba. I
-know Tum Tum, too, and Dido, the dancing bear!”
-
-“Yes, they are all friends of mine,” said Tamba. “At least they were
-before I left. Now, I suppose, I’ll never see them again, for I am
-going to the jungle. But you haven’t yet told me, Tinkle, how you came
-to leave the circus.”
-
-“Oh, it’s all written down in a book,” answered the trick pony.
-
-“Oh, a book!” exclaimed Tamba. “I’ve heard Tum Tum and Dido speak of
-being in books, but I didn’t know what they meant. And I haven’t time
-to learn now, so suppose you tell me.”
-
-“Well, there’s a book all about me and my adventures,” said Tinkle,
-the trick pony. “But, as long as you can’t read it, I’ll just tell you
-that, one day, when I was in the circus doing my tricks, George, the
-boy who used to own me before I was stolen away, came to the show.
-There he and his sister saw me and they knew me again, and I was taken
-out of the circus and given back to my little master. I’ve lived with
-him ever since. We often come to this farm in the summer, and I have
-just been giving him and his sister and some of the other children a
-ride in the pony cart. George is very nice to me, and gives me lumps of
-sugar.”
-
-“I hope he isn’t the boy whom I scared in the hay,” said Tamba. “I
-would not want to scare any friend of yours, Tinkle.”
-
-“Oh, well, if you only scared him, and didn’t scratch him, I guess it
-will be all right,” said the trick pony. “But I don’t believe it was
-George you frightened, as he was out driving me. It must have been Tom,
-or one of the other boys.” And so it was, as Tinkle learned later.
-
-“And so you are going to the jungle, are you?” asked Tinkle of Tamba,
-when they had talked a while longer.
-
-“Yes, I want to get back to my old home,” answered the tiger. “I don’t
-like it in the circus. But, still, there was one thing I liked in it,
-and that was the good meals I had. I’m very hungry right now.”
-
-“Oh, excuse me!” exclaimed Tinkle. “I should have thought of that
-before. I’m so sorry! Won’t you have some of my hay or oats?”
-
-“Yes, and give him some of our bran,” added the cow who had told about
-the man coming in to milk.
-
-“Oh, thank you, very much, Tinkle. And you too, my cow friend,” replied
-the tiger gratefully. “But I can’t eat hay, bran, or oats. We tigers
-must have meat. I don’t suppose you eat any of that?”
-
-“No,” said Tinkle, “we don’t. It’s too bad! I don’t know how we can
-give you anything to eat. It’s no fun to be hungry, either.”
-
-“I know how we can feed your tiger friend,” said one of the big farm
-horses.
-
-“How?” eagerly asked Tinkle. He felt just as you would feel if some
-friend came to visit you and you couldn’t give him anything to eat.
-“How can I feed Tamba on the meat that he likes?” asked Tinkle.
-
-“I’ll tell you,” went on the horse. “You know the big dog who drives
-the sheep to and from the meadow?”
-
-“Oh, yes, I know our sheep-dog very well,” said Tinkle. “He is a friend
-of mine.”
-
-“Well, he has company,” went on the horse. “A dog named Don has come
-to see him and spend the day. I came in just now from plowing one of
-the fields, and I saw the farmer’s wife put a big plate of meat and
-bones out near the dog kennel. She said it would do for our dog and his
-friend, Don.”
-
-“Yes, but if the meat is for the dogs they’ll eat it all up, and there
-won’t be any for Tamba,” said Tinkle.
-
-“Oh, but wait a minute!” neighed the horse. “I didn’t finish. Don and
-our dog went off to the woods. I heard them say they would be gone for
-a long time, and maybe they would find something to eat there. So if
-they don’t come back to eat the bones and meat Tamba can have it.”
-
-“Yes,” said Tinkle, “I suppose he can. I hope Don doesn’t come back.”
-
-“I hope so, too,” said Tamba. “I’m getting hungrier every minute.”
-
-“I’ll go out and look,” said Tinkle. “It will soon be dark, and if the
-plate of meat is still by the dog kennel, you can sneak out and get
-it, Tamba, and no one will see you. I’ll go and look.”
-
-Tinkle, the trick pony, was not kept tied in a stall as were the other
-horses. He could roam about as he liked, and so he trotted out of the
-barn to where the farm dog had his house, or kennel. There, surely
-enough, was a big plate of meat and some large bones, large enough,
-even, for a lion or a tiger.
-
-“It’s all right,” said Tinkle, when he came trotting back. “The meat
-is there, Tamba, and I didn’t see anything of Carlo, our dog, nor his
-friend, Don. Now if they don’t come back until dark, why, you can go
-out and have a good meal.”
-
-“I will, thank you,” returned Tamba, and he wished, with all his heart,
-that Don and the other dog would not come back.
-
-“Of course I don’t want to see them hungry,” thought Tamba, “but they
-may get something to eat in the woods, and perhaps I couldn’t do that.
-There may be no muskrats there.”
-
-Everything came out all right. The twilight faded, and it became dark.
-Then Tamba, who remained hidden in the stable, crept softly out to the
-plate of meat and bones that had been left for the dogs. He ate up
-everything and gnawed the bones, and then he got a drink of water from
-the horse trough and felt much better.
-
-“And now, Tinkle, I will bid you and your kind friends good-by and be
-on my way to get back to the jungle,” said Tamba, after he had eaten.
-
-“Oh, are you going to run away?” asked the trick pony. “You’ll be just
-like Don, the dog, then. He ran away, too.”
-
-“But he ran back again, as I have heard my friend, Nero, the circus
-lion, say,” replied Tamba. “I am not exactly running away from you. I
-ran away from the circus, but I am only leaving you after paying you a
-visit. And I liked my visit very much. That meat, too, was very good.
-Thank you, Tinkle.”
-
-“I only wish there had been more of it,” said the trick pony. “But, if
-you have to go, I suppose you must leave. I hope you’ll get safely to
-your jungle.”
-
-But Tamba had many adventures ahead of him before that time. He said
-good-by to Tinkle and the farm animals, and then, looking out of the
-barn and peering through the darkness, to see that none of the farmer’s
-men were on the watch with their guns, Tamba slunk out into the night.
-
-Once more he was on his way, traveling to find his jungle. On through
-the dark woods and over the fields went Tamba, taking care to keep away
-from houses where people might live who would see him and tell the
-circus men to come and get him. Tamba did not want to be caught.
-
-So, for several days, Tamba traveled on. Often he was hungry and
-thirsty, but he managed to find things to eat once in a while, and now
-and again he came to springs of water or streams where he drank. So,
-though he did not have a very good time, he managed to live.
-
-One evening, just as it was getting dark, Tamba sniffed the air and
-smelled a smell which told him he was near another stable and barn. It
-was not the one where Tinkle lived, though.
-
-“I wonder if I can get anything to eat here,” thought Tamba.
-
-Carefully and softly the tame tiger crept around the corner of the
-carriage house. Near by he saw what seemed to be a low building without
-any roof a little way ahead of him, and from this place came gruntings
-and squealings.
-
-“Get over on your own side of the trough! You’re eating all my sour
-milk!” said one squealy voice.
-
-“I am not, either, Squinty!” came the answer. “I want something to eat
-just as much as you do!”
-
-“Ha! Something to eat!” thought Tamba who heard and understood this
-animal talk. “I wonder who those chaps are, and who Squinty is. And I
-wonder if they have enough for me to eat. I’m going to see!”
-
-Up to the pen, which had no roof, went Tamba, and, rising on his two
-hind legs, he looked over the side and down in. There he saw a number
-of pigs who were drinking sour milk and bran from a trough.
-
-One of the pigs, with a queer droop to one eye, looked up and saw Tamba
-peering in.
-
-“Hello!” grunted this pig. “Who are you, and what’s the matter?”
-
-“I’m Tamba, a tame tiger,” was the answer, “and the matter is that I’m
-hungry. Who are you?”
-
-“Squinty, the comical pig!” was the grunting reply. “And you had better
-travel on! We have nothing here for tigers to eat!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII
-
-TAMBA IN THE CITY
-
-
-Tamba, the tame tiger, rearing up on his hind legs to look down into
-the pig pen, saw the funny look on the face of the animal who had
-spoken to him.
-
-“What’s that you say?” asked Tamba in a growling voice.
-
-“I said we didn’t have anything to give tigers,” went on the comical
-pig, and really he was comical, for his one eye had such a funny look
-as it drooped toward one ear. It seemed to be looking in two ways at
-once, and that is something you don’t often see in a pig.
-
-“Well, it seems to me I smell something very good,” went on Tamba. “It
-smells like milk to me.” When he was a little tiger Tamba had liked
-milk very much, and now, even though he was older, he knew it would be
-good when he was hungry.
-
-“Yes, you do smell milk,” went on Squinty. “But it is sour.”
-
-“Sour or sweet, it makes no difference to me,” replied Tamba. “I am
-hungry enough to eat anything.”
-
-“Well, I don’t want to be cross or impolite,” said Squinty, “but there
-is only enough sour milk for us pigs. We can’t give you any.”
-
-“Ha! Well, I simply must have something to eat!” returned Tamba, and
-his voice was more growly now. “If I can’t get milk I must have meat. I
-remember once, in the jungle, eating a little pig who looked something
-like you. What’s to stop me taking a few bites off you, if you won’t
-give me any of your milk?”
-
-“Oh, ho! So you think you can bite me, do you?” squealed Squinty.
-“Well, we’ll see about that!”
-
-Now Squinty was a brave little animal, and he had seen more of the
-world than some of the other small pigs in the pen. In fact, Squinty
-had had a number of adventures, and those of you who have read my first
-book entitled, “Squinty, the Comical Pig,” know that Squinty was not
-much afraid of anything.
-
-So no sooner did he hear Tamba talk that way, about taking bites, and
-so on, than Squinty ran to where there was a loose board in the pen,
-and out he popped.
-
-“Ho! So you think because you’re a big, circus tiger that you can scare
-me, do you?” squealed Squinty. “Well, I’ll show you that I’m not a bit
-afraid!”
-
-Now, as it happened, near the pen, where the farmer intended to use
-it the next day, was a pail of whitewash. It was like thick, white
-water, and the pail was full of it. Squinty gave one look at the pail
-of whitewash, and a glance at Tamba, who had taken his forepaws down
-off the edge of the pen, and was standing on all four feet looking at
-Squinty.
-
-“There! Take that and see how you like it!” squealed Squinty, and with
-his strong nose, made for digging down under the ground after roots and
-things, Squinty upset the pail of whitewash and gave it a push toward
-Tamba.
-
-The whitewash splashed out, and lots of it splattered on the tame
-tiger, so that he was splashed and speckled with spots of white as well
-as being marked with black and yellow stripes.
-
-“Now how do you like yourself?” asked Squinty of Tamba, as he looked at
-the tame tiger in the moonlight, for the moon was just coming up. “If
-you try to bite me or any of my friends I’ll splash some more whitewash
-on you!”
-
-“You can’t,” said Tamba. “There isn’t any more left in the pail. It’s
-empty; I can see for myself. I guess I got most of it on me.”
-
-[Illustration: The whitewash splashed out and splattered on the tame
-tiger]
-
-“Well, if I can’t throw whitewash on you I’ll throw something else!”
-threatened Squinty. “You’ve got to leave us pigs alone!”
-
-“Yes,” said Tamba, “I can see that I’d better. I didn’t know you were
-such a fierce chap, Squinty.”
-
-“Well, I didn’t mean to be cross,” said the pig. “But when you talked
-of biting me, why, I just couldn’t help it. I’m sorry I spotted you
-with white like that.”
-
-“It’s all my fault,” returned Tamba. “I shouldn’t have said anything
-about biting you. Being splashed with whitewash serves me right. But I
-am very hungry, and your sour milk smelled very good!”
-
-“I’m afraid there isn’t much left now,” said Squinty. “The pigs were
-very hungry to-night. But if you’ll come over to the side of the pen,
-where I broke out to rush at you, I’ll see if there is anything else.
-Sometimes they throw kitchen table scraps into our trough, and there
-are bits of meat which we small pigs don’t eat. You may have that, if
-there is any. Tigers like meat, I’ve heard.”
-
-“Yes,” said Tamba, “I like meat very much. It is about all I can eat,
-though I could manage to drink some milk――sour or sweet.”
-
-“Come, we’ll go see what there is,” went on Squinty. “When I said we
-had nothing for tigers I didn’t think about the meat scraps.”
-
-So Squinty led Tamba back to the side of the pen whence the little pig
-had pushed his way out. Then Squinty explained to the other pigs what
-had happened.
-
-“Yes, here are some meat scraps,” said one of the pigs, when Squinty
-had told how hungry Tamba was. “It isn’t very much, though.”
-
-“Even a little will keep me from starving,” said Tamba. “When I get to
-my jungle I’ll have all I want to eat, but just now it is pretty hard
-to find enough. In the circus I had plenty.”
-
-“Oh, so you’re from the circus, are you?” asked Squinty. “I used to
-know some animals in a circus. There was Mappo, the merry monkey.”
-
-“Yes, I have heard of him, too,” said Tamba. “But he isn’t with the
-show now. Ah, but this meat tastes good!”
-
-The tame tiger was now chewing the scraps the pigs had brushed aside as
-they did not want them. Tamba did not feel so hungry now, but he did
-feel queer where the whitewash had splashed on him.
-
-“I’m sorry about that,” said Squinty. “If you go down to the end of the
-meadow there is a pond, and you can wash off the white splashes. It’s
-warm enough to take a bath.”
-
-“I’m not very fond of water,” said Tamba, “though I do take a bath now
-and then. I guess I can wash off the white stuff by dipping my paws in
-the water and rubbing them over my striped coat. I’ll do it.”
-
-And that is what Tamba did after he had eaten up all the meat scraps
-there were in the pigs’ pen. Then he said good-by to Squinty and the
-others and started off again.
-
-“I must get to my jungle,” said the tiger. “I have been away from the
-circus quite a while now, and, as yet, I have not come to the jungle.”
-
-“But you have had lots of adventures,” said Squinty, the comical pig,
-for Tamba had told of some of the things that had happened to him. “You
-have had almost as many adventures as I, Tamba. I suppose you can call
-that an adventure, when I splashed the whitewash on you.”
-
-“Yes,” agreed Tamba, “I think that, most certainly, was an adventure. I
-don’t want another like it, though.”
-
-So Tamba traveled on again. He thought, if he went far enough, he must,
-some day or other, come to the jungle where he used to live. But he did
-not know which way to go, and, often as not, he went wrong. However, as
-Squinty said, the tame tiger was having many adventures.
-
-He had a queer one the second night after he had met Squinty, and this
-is the way it happened. Tamba had been roaming along in the night,
-after having caught something to eat in the woods, and at last he came
-out on a road which stretched far and away in the moonlight.
-
-“That is a long road to travel,” thought Tamba. “I think I will take
-a rest before I go down it any farther. I’ll hide somewhere and wait
-until morning.”
-
-Tamba looked around for a place to hide, and saw a big pile of hay. He
-knew it was hay, since he had often seen it in the circus tent, and he
-remembered having hidden in the hay in the barn.
-
-“But this hay isn’t in a barn,” said Tamba, as he looked at the pile.
-“It seems to be on a wagon, as my cage used to be.”
-
-And that is just what it was. Tamba had come to a farm, and a little
-way down the road from the farmhouse was a wagon loaded with a great
-pile of hay. The farmer had loaded the hay on the wagon the evening
-before, so as to have it all ready to hitch his horses to and pull it
-into the city early in the morning. The farmer was going to sell the
-hay in the big city.
-
-“Well, that hay will make a nice place for me to sleep,” thought Tamba.
-He gave a big jump, and landed on top of the load of hay. There were,
-as yet, no horses hitched to the wagon. That would be done in the
-morning.
-
-Tamba pawed out a nice, cozy bed for himself on top of the load of hay,
-burrowed away down in, pulled some hay over him as a covering, and
-went to sleep.
-
-How long he slept the tame tiger did not know. But when he suddenly
-awoke, he saw the sun shining, and he heard a rumble and roar all about
-him.
-
-“What’s this? Where am I? What has happened?” thought Tamba.
-
-He saw the hay all about him. He felt the jolting and sway of the
-wagon. The roaring sound became louder. Tamba looked out between the
-wisps of hay. He saw a strange sight.
-
-“Why, I’m in a big city!” thought the tiger. “The load of hay has come
-to the city, and I came with it! Oh, dear, I am farther than ever from
-my jungle! What shall I do?”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX
-
-TAMBA IN THE SUBWAY
-
-
-Tamba, the tame tiger, had really come to the city on a load of hay. I
-know it sounds very strange to say that, but it really happened. I have
-often seen dogs riding along on a load of hay that had started to ride
-in the country, at the farmhouse where they lived, and had come all the
-way to the city. So if a dog can ride on a load of hay I don’t see why
-a tiger can’t, especially when he is a tame tiger.
-
-Anyhow, that’s what Tamba did. He rode along on the load of hay until
-it reached the big, noisy city. But the funny part of it was that the
-man who drove the load of hay didn’t know he was giving a ride to a
-tiger. If he had known that I don’t believe he would have guided his
-horses along so easily, nor do I believe the horses themselves would
-have gone so quietly.
-
-But there Tamba was, snugly curled up in a little nest on top of the
-load of hay, where no one could see him. He could look out and down at
-the city streets through which he was passing, and he saw many strange
-sights. But he was used to them, and he was not afraid of being in the
-city. For he remembered having seen a city like this many times before
-when he was in his cage and the circus parade had gone up and down the
-streets to show the animals, so that boys and girls would be all the
-more anxious to come to the performance.
-
-“Well, I wonder what will happen to me now,” thought Tamba, as the hay
-wagon rumbled along the city streets. “I can’t stay here much longer.
-Some one will be sure to see me, and perhaps the man who owns this hay
-is taking it to the very circus where I used to live. If that happens
-they’ll get me back in a cage again, and I don’t want that to happen. I
-must be very careful!”
-
-On and on went the load of hay, with Tamba hiding at the top, and,
-pretty soon, the man drove into a sort of big yard. There were trees,
-and grass, and some buildings. But what made Tamba sit up and sniff
-eagerly was the smell of wild animals. I dare say you have often
-noticed it yourself when you have gone to the circus. Even with your
-eyes shut you can tell as soon as you enter the wild animal tent.
-
-“Dear me, this is very strange!” thought the tame tiger. “Can the man,
-with his load of hay, have brought me back to the very circus from
-which I ran away? It smells so, but I don’t see any of the big tents,
-nor yet the barn where I used to live in winter. Besides, this is
-summer, not winter. I wonder what it all means!”
-
-The more Tamba thought about it and the stronger the wild animal smell
-came to him, the more the tame tiger was puzzled. The load of hay, in
-which he was hidden, rumbled along, down a little hill, and then Tamba
-heard the man call:
-
-“Whoa!”
-
-That meant for the horses to stop. Tamba had often heard the circus men
-call that to their horses when they wanted them to stop pulling the big
-cage wagons, and so the tiger understood.
-
-“Now I wonder what will happen to me,” thought Tamba. He raised his
-head up from his snug nest in the hay and saw what he knew to be a
-barn, though it was not like the one near which he had met Squinty, the
-comical pig, nor like the one where he had frightened the boy Tom.
-
-“But it’s a barn all right,” thought Tamba. “And there must be some of
-my tiger, elephant and lion friends near it, else there wouldn’t be
-that wild animal smell. I wonder if Tum Tum, Nero and Dido are here.
-Maybe they brought them here after the train wreck.”
-
-Tamba did not know what to think, but what he wanted to do was to keep
-out of sight of any men who might be around, until he could think of
-what to do.
-
-“For I’m not in my jungle, that’s sure,” said Tamba to himself. “And
-how to get there I don’t know. But I’m not going back to the circus if
-I can help it.”
-
-Tamba now felt some one pulling at the load of hay, as if about to
-unload it from the wagon. Then the tame tiger, giving a look over the
-side and seeing no one, slipped and slid down, and, noticing an open
-door in the barn, through it he ran and hid in a dark corner.
-
-“There! Now maybe they can’t find me!” thought the tiger. “I’ll stay
-here until it’s dark, and then run out. But where am I?”
-
-Tamba asked himself this question over and over again. Outside the barn
-he heard men talking and horses moving about, and with the wild animal
-smell came the sweet smell of new hay――the hay on which he had ridden
-to the city.
-
-“The man must be taking the hay off the wagon,” thought Tamba. “I can’t
-ride on it again. Well, perhaps I shall not need to. But I should like
-to know where I am, and what all this means.”
-
-For some time Tamba remained hidden in a dark corner of the barn, and
-then, suddenly, an animal came running in and Tamba knew at once what
-kind it was. For it was striped almost the same as was the tiger
-himself――with yellow and black――and it was a zebra.
-
-“Oh, hello, my friend!” called Tamba, in animal talk, from the place
-where he was hidden. “Are you running away from the circus, too, Mr.
-Zebra?”
-
-“Circus? Why, no. I never was in a circus, though I’ve heard about such
-things,” the zebra answered. “But how did you get out of your cage? I
-didn’t know any of the tigers were loose.”
-
-“Oh, I got out some time ago, in a train wreck,” answered Tamba. “But
-what is the circus doing here, and have they had the parade yet?”
-
-“Look here!” exclaimed the zebra, as he chewed some wisps of hay he
-picked up from the barn floor. “I guess we don’t either of us know what
-the other is talking about. This isn’t a circus. This is a zoölogical
-park, in a big city, and I am one of the animals. Only, as I am very
-tame, they let me run about the yard where the barn is. We have some
-lions and tigers here, but they are kept in cages. Are you one of the
-zoo tigers?”
-
-“No,” answered Tamba. “I was a circus tiger. But I ran away, and I am
-going back to my jungle. So this is the zoo. Now I understand.”
-
-What had happened was this. The farmer, on whose load of hay Tamba had
-hidden, gone to sleep, and been given a ride to the city, had brought
-the hay to the zoölogical park, to sell, as he often did. He had driven
-it right up to the barn to unload, and then it was that Tamba slipped
-off and hid before any one saw him. And the wild animal smell that
-Tamba noticed was the smell of the animals in the park. I suppose you
-have been to the zoölogical park near your own city, perhaps, and have
-noticed that smell. It is almost like a circus, so it is no wonder
-Tamba was puzzled.
-
-“So this is the zoo, is it?” he asked the zebra. “Well, I don’t want to
-stay here, any more than I want to stay in a circus. But how can I get
-away?”
-
-“Well, if you really belonged here, of course it wouldn’t be right for
-me to tell you how to get away,” said the zebra. “But as you are not
-one of the zoo animals, it will be all right for you to run off. You
-had better wait until it is dark, though, and then you can crawl out
-through the fence near the back of this barn. But you will be in the
-middle of a big city, and not in your jungle.”
-
-“I know,” said Tamba, sadly. “But I’m used to cities. I have been in
-parades in them often enough. I’ll find my way out somehow, and then
-I’ll go to my jungle. But I wish I had something to eat. You haven’t a
-bone or a piece of meat, have you?”
-
-“I am sorry to say I have not,” replied the zebra. “All I eat is hay
-and grains. But I can show you where to get a drink of water.”
-
-“I shall like that,” said the tame tiger, “as I am very thirsty.”
-
-So the zebra showed the tiger where, in the barn, was a tub of water
-out of which the horses who worked in the zoölogical park got their
-drinks. There Tamba quenched his thirst and felt better. Then he
-crawled back into the dark corner to hide. The zebra had to go away,
-but he promised to come back and let Tamba know when it was dark enough
-for the tiger to run out and start afresh on his journey to the jungle.
-
-All that day Tamba remained hidden in the barn. He saw none of the
-other wild animals, and the zebra did not come back. Tamba was getting
-hungrier and hungrier, but he knew he dared not go out to look for
-anything to eat. If he had the park men would have seen him and chased
-after him, either catching him to put in one of their cages, or else
-sending him back to the circus. And Tamba did not want that.
-
-After a while it became darker. Tamba sneaked out and got another
-drink, and then in a little while he heard the patter of the feet of
-his zebra friend on the floor of the barn.
-
-“Are you there, Tamba?” asked the zebra, in animal talk.
-
-“Yes,” answered the tiger.
-
-“Well, it’s dark enough now for you to set out,” went on the zebra.
-“Cut across the park over the big field you’ll see as soon as you leave
-this barn. That way will take you to a street where there are not so
-many cars and wagons as on the street nearest this side. It is quieter.”
-
-“That’s what I want――to be quiet,” said Tamba. “That’s why I want to go
-back to my jungle.”
-
-Tamba took another drink of water, for he did not know when he would
-get any more, and then, having said good-by to his friend, the striped
-zebra, the tame tiger went softly out of the barn into the night. He
-saw the big field and, on the other side, a row of lights. At first
-they looked like the lights around the circus tents when a night-show
-is being given, but when Tamba looked a second time he knew they were
-street lights. He was still in the big city.
-
-“Good-by!” called the zebra after him. “I hope you soon come to your
-jungle.”
-
-“Thank you! I hope so myself,” said Tamba.
-
-He ran across the big park field in the darkness. No one saw him, for
-few persons are in the park at night. Tamba sniffed the air, and he
-smelled water. There was such a strong smell of water that Tamba knew
-it must come from a big river or a lake.
-
-“And it smells like salt water, too,” thought the tame tiger. “I
-remember that smell of salt water. I smelled it when they put me on a
-ship and brought me away from my jungle. Perhaps my jungle home is just
-across that salt water. I am going to see.”
-
-What Tamba smelled was the salt water of a big river that flowed
-through the city down to the ocean. And beyond the ocean lay the
-jungle. This much Tamba had guessed.
-
-“I am going toward that salt water,” said the tiger to himself. “This
-is the first time I have smelled it since I was on the ship. I believe,
-after all, I shall at last get to my jungle.”
-
-But there were quite a few adventures for Tamba to have before he
-reached his old home.
-
-On across the big field in the zoölogical park ran Tamba. He was coming
-nearer and nearer to the row of lights, nearer and nearer to the smell
-of salt water, and, also, nearer and nearer to a city street. It was
-this street that Tamba feared most. Once he was across that, he thought
-everything would be all right.
-
-He came to a low, stone wall around the park. He looked and listened as
-well as he could. He did not see any one who he thought would try to
-catch him.
-
-With a leap and a bound Tamba cleared the low, stone wall and found
-himself on the sidewalk of a street. Just at this place, and at
-this time, there did not happen to be any wagons, street cars or
-automobiles. Tamba was beginning to think everything was coming along
-finely, and that he would easily get to the salt water when, all of a
-sudden, he heard a woman scream. Then a man, who was with her, cried:
-
-“What’s the matter? What is it?”
-
-“A tiger! A tiger! Look, there’s a tiger loose in the street!”
-
-“Why――why――so it is!” exclaimed the man, who, with the woman, had come
-walking along soon after Tamba leaped over the wall. “It’s a real, live
-tiger! It must have escaped from the zoo. I’ll drive it back!”
-
-“Oh, don’t! He might bite or claw you!” cried the woman. “Get a
-policeman!”
-
-“I will,” answered the man, and he began to call loudly.
-
-“This is no place for me!” quickly thought Tamba. “I must run and hide
-again.”
-
-Of course he did not know what the man and woman were saying, but he
-knew that they would want to catch him, or call some one to do it, and
-so Tamba knew he must hide.
-
-He looked about for a good place to go. He did not want to jump back
-into the park. Up the street, a little way, he saw what he thought was
-the opening to a big cave. True, it was lighter than the entrance to
-the jungle cave where Tamba used to live, but perhaps it might do for a
-hiding place.
-
-“I’ll go in there!” decided Tamba.
-
-The tiger turned away from the man, who was still shouting for the
-police, and from the woman, who had covered her eyes with her hands,
-and then Tamba ran for what he thought was the doorway of a cave. At
-the entrance he could see that it stretched away out in a sort of dark
-tunnel.
-
-“This is the place for me!” said Tamba to himself, and the next moment
-he was running down some stone steps. As he went down he heard a loud
-rumbling and roaring.
-
-“Ha! There is going to be a thunder storm,” thought Tamba. “I came to
-this cave just in time!”
-
-And, back in the street, where they had first seen the jungle beast,
-the man and woman cried:
-
-“Oh, the tiger ran down into the subway! The tiger is in the subway!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X
-
-TAMBA AT THE DOCK
-
-
-Queer as it may seem, Tamba had done that very thing. He had run
-from the street into the opening of a subway station in a big city,
-thinking it was a cave. And if you have ever been in a city where the
-street cars run underground instead of on the surface, as wagons and
-automobiles do, or instead of up in the air, as the elevated trains
-run, then you will understand how it was that Tamba made his mistake.
-For it was a mistake to go down into the subway, thinking it was a cave.
-
-The rumbling and roaring sound Tamba heard was a train coming along the
-subway, and, being underground, it made much more noise and racket than
-it would have done up on the surface. So it is no wonder the tame tiger
-thought it was a thunder storm.
-
-Down the subway steps he ran. He saw a dark tunnel stretching out both
-ways from the station. It was light on the station platforms where the
-subway trains stopped, but beyond this place, at each side, the dark
-tunnel of the subway stretched out.
-
-Tamba saw crowds of persons getting on and off the train, and as quick
-as a flash he hid behind a candy counter and newspaper stand, where it
-was partly dark. Tamba did not want any men to see him now, for since
-he had smelled the salt water he wished, more than ever, to get across
-it and back to his jungle.
-
-“Well,” thought the tame tiger as he crouched in the darkness behind
-the candy stand, where the boy tending it, busy selling evening papers,
-did not notice him, “well, I don’t know what this all is, nor what it’s
-about, but I guess this isn’t the kind of cave I’m looking for. It
-isn’t a jungle cave at all. It’s much too light and too noisy. It’s as
-bad as the circus. I must get out of here if I can.”
-
-But Tamba knew better than to rush out when so many people were coming
-and going. He wanted to wait until they had gone. But there were so
-many of them it seemed that they would never go. And pretty soon a
-policeman, and several excited men who did not wear blue suits with
-brass buttons ran down the subway steps.
-
-“He came right down here!” said one excited man. “My wife and I were
-walking along the stone wall by the park when the tiger jumped over
-right in front of us. Then he ran down these subway steps.”
-
-“Then he must be here yet,” said the policeman. “And if he is, we’ll
-catch him and send him back to the zoo. If he came out of one of the
-cages there he must be pretty tame, and he won’t hurt any one. Come on,
-now, everybody! We’ll have a tiger hunt in the subway!”
-
-Of course Tamba did not know what all this talk meant, but he knew
-enough to guess that the policeman and the other men were trying to
-capture him. So Tamba wanted to get to a better place to hide than just
-behind a newspaper stand. And he was lucky enough to find it.
-
-The lower part of the stand was hollow, like a big box. In it the
-newspaper boy kept his old papers, empty candy boxes and the like, and
-there was plenty of room for a tiger in there. There was a door to this
-underneath place, and the door happened to be open.
-
-Tamba saw it, saw, too, that it was dark and quiet underneath the
-stand, and so he crawled in under there. A better place for a runaway
-tiger could not have been found. Tamba curled softly up among some
-bundles of old papers, and there he stayed while the hunt was going on.
-
-Up and down the subway station platforms the policeman and the others
-looked for the tame tiger. But they never thought of looking beneath
-the hollow newspaper and candy stand, and there Tamba stayed as snugly
-as you please.
-
-“Well,” said the policeman at last to the man whose wife had screamed
-so at the first sight of Tamba, “I guess you made a mistake, my friend.
-You didn’t see any tiger at all. You dreamed it.”
-
-“I’m sure I didn’t dream,” said the man. “I wasn’t asleep. I saw that
-tiger come into this subway as plain as anything.”
-
-“Well, then he must have run up the steps on the other side,” said the
-policeman. “He could have done that before we got here. At any rate the
-tiger is gone, and we may as well go out and look for him somewhere
-else. He isn’t here!”
-
-The excitement soon quieted down, the searchers went upstairs, and
-Tamba was left to himself in his hiding place beneath the newspaper and
-candy stand.
-
-He could hear people walking up and down on the stone platform, and he
-could hear them talking. They were talking about him, as it happened,
-for the news of a tiger being loose somewhere in that part of the city
-had spread. But Tamba, of course, did not know what the men and women
-subway passengers were saying. He could hear the rumble and roar of the
-subway trains, and they sounded something like the trains on which the
-circus traveled from town to town. But Tamba did not come out of his
-hiding place to look at them. He stayed quietly in the cubby-hole under
-the stand.
-
-[Illustration: But the man was asleep and did not see the tiger.]
-
-After a while, as the hours passed, it became quieter in the subway.
-There were fewer trains, and hardly any persons were traveling now. At
-last, along about three o’clock in the morning, no trains ran at all.
-The agent at the station went to sleep in his little booth, and the
-newspaper boy had gone home long ago. Tamba thrust his head out of his
-hiding place. He heard nothing and saw no one.
-
-“Now is the time for me to run out and go to the salt water,” said the
-tiger to himself. “This time I shall surely get back to my jungle, I
-hope.”
-
-Carefully and softly, Tamba crept along the subway platform. He passed
-out of the ticket gate, right in front of the man in the little booth,
-but the man was asleep and did not see the tiger.
-
-Up the same steps down which he had run some hours before, Tamba now
-crept. He reached the open air and could see the stars glittering
-overhead. The night was clear and warm. Tamba liked it very much.
-Eagerly he sniffed the air and he smelled salt water. He turned his
-face toward the river and began to stalk slowly along. He wanted to
-cross the salt water and get home to his jungle.
-
-And as Tamba slunk along he began to remember how hungry he was. Since
-leaving the circus he had not eaten very much.
-
-“Oh, if I could have a nice, juicy piece of meat now, how good it would
-taste!” thought Tamba. But of course no meat stores were open at that
-hour, and, if there had been, Tamba could not have gotten any meat from
-them. If the tiger had strolled, no matter how quietly and politely,
-into a meat shop, men would have driven him away, or have caught him
-and shut him up in a cage.
-
-“But I do want something to eat!” sadly thought the tiger.
-
-Just then a smell came to his nose that made him lick his lips with his
-red tongue and made him sniff very hard with his black nose.
-
-“I smell milk!” thought Tamba. “And it isn’t sour milk, either, like
-that which Squinty, the comical pig, was drinking. I smell fresh milk,
-and I wish I had some!”
-
-When Tamba smelled anything good he knew how to find it, even if he
-could not see it. He just had to “follow his nose” until he came to it.
-All jungle animals, and even your dogs and cats, do that. So when Tamba
-smelled the milk he turned his nose toward it and walked along until he
-came to it. And where do you suppose it was?
-
-Why, an early-morning milkman had left a big can of milk in front of a
-grocery store, and it was this milk――some of which had slopped out from
-the can――that Tamba had smelled.
-
-“Well, here’s milk all right, that’s sure,” said Tamba to himself, as
-he sniffed around the can in the doorway of the store. “But how can I
-get it out? I can’t scratch or bite through this tin can. And, oh, how
-hungry I am! A good, big drink of milk would make me feel much better!”
-
-Tamba walked up and down in front of the can. It stood in the dark
-corner of a sheltered doorway of a store on a main street, but at that
-hour of the morning, after the milkman had passed, hardly any one was
-ever out.
-
-“I must have some of that milk!” thought the hungry Tamba. He pawed and
-clawed at the can, hoping he could find some way of getting it open,
-when, all of a sudden, he knocked the can right over. It fell to the
-sidewalk with a clatter and a bang, and the cover came off.
-
-Out gushed the white milk, and some of it spilled right into the big,
-deep cover of the can itself. That was enough for Tamba. Here he had
-the milk, in a dish all ready for him to lap it up with his red tongue,
-and that is just what he did!
-
-“My, but that’s good!” thought the tiger, as he drank all the milk out
-of the can cover. “I am having better luck than at first. There is even
-enough milk for that pig Squinty, if he should happen to come along.”
-
-But of course Squinty was far away. Tamba lapped up all the milk from
-the can cover, and then he saw where a little puddle had formed in
-a hole in the sidewalk. Tamba took that milk, too, and then he felt
-better.
-
-“Now to go down to the salt water and find my jungle,” he said to
-himself, as he licked up the last drops of milk.
-
-So Tamba started off down the city streets once more, and because every
-one was in bed and asleep no one saw him.
-
-But there was a very much surprised store-keeper who, the next morning,
-went to take in the big can of milk. It was upset and spilled.
-
-“Ha! Some bad boys must have done this!” thought the store-keeper. “I
-must tell the police!”
-
-But wouldn’t he have opened wide his eyes in surprise if he had known a
-tiger had drunk the milk, and if he had seen Tamba doing it? Perhaps it
-is just as well he did not.
-
-But Tamba never knew what a sad trick he had played on the store-keeper.
-The tame tiger slunk along, coming nearer and nearer to the smell of the
-salt water, and at last he came to the river itself. It really was a
-river of salt water, and ran down to the big ocean. But the river was
-not like those in the jungle. It had no banks of green vines, mud, and
-trees. Instead, all along the river were big houses built on piers with
-the water in between, and it was to one of these docks that Tamba slunk
-down in the darkness.
-
-Tied at the docks were big ships which would soon steam down the river
-and cross the ocean. Tamba knew what ships were. He had come across the
-ocean in one when he was brought away from the jungle.
-
-“I think I have found the place I want at last,” said Tamba to himself,
-as he walked slowly along a pier. “It is the place of the salt water
-where I landed when I first came to this country. Now I have only to go
-back the other way and I’ll be at my jungle. And how glad I shall be!
-Now I will find a good place to hide until morning, and then I’ll see
-what is best to do. I am tired now, but I had a good drink of milk and
-I can sleep.”
-
-So Tamba found a quiet hiding place on the ship dock and went to sleep.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI
-
-TAMBA ON THE SHIP
-
-
-The sun was brightly shining when Tamba, the tame tiger, awakened in
-his bed at the dock. I call it a “bed” for he had snuggled down on a
-pile of bags between some boxes and bales, and this is as good a bed as
-ever a tiger asks for. Often they are glad enough to sleep on the bare
-boards of the circus cages, and even in their jungle caves they never
-have more than a pile of dried leaves or grass.
-
-Tamba could look out through the cracks between the boxes and bales and
-see the yellow sunshine on the dock. The sunshine made yellow stripes,
-almost the color of Tamba’s tawny coat. He could feel the soft, warm
-wind blowing in on him, and he could also smell the salt water.
-
-“I am in the right place at last,” thought Tamba. “But I must be
-careful. I do not want to be caught when I am so near my jungle.”
-
-You see Tamba did not know just how far it was down the big salt river
-and across the big, salt ocean to his jungle home. All he knew was
-that the salt water here smelled just as the salt water had smelled
-when he was put on the ship, to be brought away from his home in India.
-
-And there were ships at the dock. Tamba could see them, but he knew
-better than to run out now and get on board one. For, now that it was
-daylight, there were many men on the dock. They were driving their
-wagons and drays about, laden as they were with things to go on board
-the ships, and Tamba knew that if he ran out, in plain sight of these
-men, some of them would chase him, and, perhaps, catch him.
-
-“So I’ll just stay hidden here until it gets dark again,” thought Tamba
-to himself. “Then I’ll go on one of those big floating houses, which
-Tum Tum says are called ships, and I’ll get back to my jungle. If I
-wait until night no one will see me, and then they can’t catch me to
-send me back to the circus.”
-
-So Tamba curled up in his snug little nest among the boxes and barrels
-on the pier, and remained hidden. Of course if men had come to take
-away those particular boxes they would have found Tamba, but, as it
-happened, they did not, and so he was safe.
-
-After a while, though, Tamba began to feel hungry. Milk for a tiger,
-even though it happened to be the full top of a can, is not enough. He
-must have meat, and meat was what Tamba wanted just then. He sniffed
-and smelled around among the boxes and bales which formed his nest, but
-no meat smell came to his nose. If one of the boxes had happened to
-have meat in it, perhaps Tamba might have clawed it open and gotten a
-meal. But, as it was, there was nothing for him to eat.
-
-“Never mind,” he thought to himself; “perhaps to-night, when I get on
-the ship, I can find something good to eat.”
-
-But Tamba was to have something before then. About noon the dock on the
-edge of the salty river, where many ships were tied, became a very busy
-place. Though Tamba did not know it, the ships were being loaded with
-things to be taken across the sea and sold.
-
-The dock was crowded with wagons, horses, automobiles and men, all
-being driven or hurrying to and fro, to get the big ships ready to
-sail. For there were two ships in this dock, one on either side of the
-pier, and Tamba was in a place called a warehouse, in between the two
-vessels.
-
-So, as I say, the dock and warehouse was a very busy place at noon. And
-as men must eat, as well as tigers, when the twelve o’clock whistles
-blew some of the drivers tied their horses wherever they happened to
-be, put nose-bags of oats on the horses’ necks, and then the men went
-to get their own dinners.
-
-Now, as it happened, a wagon, with a load of meat on it, was stopped by
-its driver near Tamba’s place. The end of the wagon, which was filled
-with big pieces of beef, pork, and mutton, was near the hole among the
-boxes where the tiger was hiding. And of course Tamba could easily
-smell this meat. In fact, the smell of it awakened him from a little
-sleep into which he had fallen.
-
-“Ha! What’s that?” asked the tiger of himself, as he opened his eyes.
-He sniffed harder. The meat smell became plainer. Then he looked up.
-Right over his head was the end of a big wagon, where the man driving
-it had backed it to get it out of the way while he fed his horses and
-went to get his own dinner. And on the end of the wagon was some nice,
-juicy meat, just the kind Tamba had been fed in the circus. Only there
-was more meat than Tamba had ever seen at one time before.
-
-The meat, as I suppose you have guessed, was to be put on board one of
-the ships to feed the passengers and crew on its journey over the salty
-sea. Of course Tamba did not know that. All he knew was that he felt
-very hungry, and that here was meat.
-
-“Well, it was very kind of some one to bring me so much meat,” thought
-the tiger to himself. “I’m sure I’m much obliged to them. And they
-left me to myself to eat it, too. They didn’t stay to stare and watch
-me, as the folks do in the circus. This is very nice.”
-
-So Tamba rose up on his hind legs, and, hidden as he was in his snug
-nest, where no one saw him, and with the end of the meat wagon so
-easily within reach, the tame tiger made a good meal. Of course he
-chewed the ends off several nice pieces of meat that were meant to go
-on board the ship, but it did not completely spoil them, and, after
-all, the tame tiger was very hungry.
-
-“My, but this tastes good!” thought the tiger, as he took bite after
-bite of juicy beef. “This is even better than the circus. I can have as
-much as I want, and there are no bones to hurt my teeth. Of course I
-like to gnaw a bone now and then, but when I am as hungry as I am now I
-want just plain chunks of meat.”
-
-And Tamba had all he wanted. He just stood there and ate and ate from
-the back of the wagon, and then, licking his jaws to make them clean,
-he curled up in his nest again, and went to sleep once more.
-
-And when the man came back, after having had his lunch, to take the
-oat-bags from the heads of his horses, he was in such a hurry to get
-his wagon unloaded, was this man, that he never noticed where Tamba had
-chewed the meat.
-
-And it was not until some days later, when the butcher on the ship was
-cutting up the meat, that it was noticed that some of the pieces were
-chewed as if by some animal.
-
-“I guess the dock rats did it,” said the ship butcher. And he never
-knew it was Tamba, any more than the grocer knew it was a tiger that
-had tipped over his can of milk.
-
-After his good meal Tamba had a fine sleep, and it was quite dark when
-he awoke again. He peered out from between the boxes, barrels and
-bales, and he saw that there were no men, horses or drays at the dock.
-It was deserted and quiet. But, over at one side, Tamba could still see
-the ships, or “floating houses,” as he called them.
-
-“Now if I can get on one of those ships I’ll soon be back at my
-jungle,” thought Tamba to himself. “But I wonder which one to go on?”
-
-Carefully and quietly he slunk out of his hiding place. He walked along
-until he came to where a sort of bridge, which is called a gangplank,
-led up to the deck of the ship. Here Tamba smelled a smell that he very
-well knew. It was a tiger smell――the smell of a wild beast.
-
-“Ha! If there have been wild jungle animals here, this is the very ship
-I want to go on,” thought Tamba. “This must have come from jungle-land.
-At no other place can I smell the wild animal smell. This is the ship
-for me! I’ll get on, hide away, and have a nice ride back to my
-jungle.”
-
-So, seeing no one about, Tamba walked softly up the plank, and stepped
-softly to the deck of the big ship. And he managed to crawl down into a
-hole without any one seeing him. Down in a hole, among some boxes and
-barrels, just like those on the dock, Tamba hid himself.
-
-“Now for my jungle!” he said to himself as he curled up.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII
-
-TAMBA IN THE JUNGLE
-
-
-Tamba, the tame tiger, had hidden himself away in the dark part of the
-ship called the “hold.” It was there that the cargo was stored――the
-place where boxes, barrels, and big wooden cases of things sent across
-the ocean were kept from the time the ship left one dock, until it came
-to another to unload.
-
-So Tamba had gone softly up the gangplank in the soft darkness of the
-night from the pier, he had dropped to the deck of the ship, and had
-crawled down what is called a “hatchway” into a hold. And there he hid.
-
-And I must tell you how it happened that Tamba smelled the wild animal
-odor on one ship, and not on another.
-
-It was because this ship had, a week or so before, brought from India
-and Africa a cargo of wild animals for a circus. There had been lions
-and tigers and elephants and snakes on the ship, and even though they
-had been taken off when the ship reached New York, some of the smell
-remained. And it was this which Tamba smelled, and which made him feel
-sure that this was a jungle-ship, or one that would take him back to
-his Indian home.
-
-All through the night Tamba slept in the hold of the ship, among the
-boxes and the barrels, as he had slept on the dock. When he awoke he
-could see a little sunshine streaming through a crack, and he knew
-another day had come.
-
-Just then he felt a queer motion. It was as if the whole ship, and
-he himself in it, had been moved along. And that is just what was
-happening. The ship was moving away from the dock, getting ready for
-the voyage across the ocean. Tamba knew what the motion meant. He had
-felt it before on his first sea voyage, when he had been brought away
-from the jungle.
-
-“Well, at last I’m on my way back to the jungle,” thought Tamba. “It’s
-lucky I found this ship.”
-
-And, indeed, Tamba was lucky in more ways than one.
-
-But, with all that, Tamba did not have a very good time on board the
-ship. In the first place he knew he had to stay in hiding, if he did
-not want to be seen, and, perhaps, shut up in a cage again, or, for all
-he knew, be sent back to the circus. The tame tiger could not go out
-on deck, as the passengers did, and breathe the fresh air and see the
-sunshine. Poor Tamba had to stay down in the dark hold, hiding among
-the boxes and barrels.
-
-And another thing was that he was hungry. After the first day when the
-ship was at sea, the tiger began to want more meat. Even though he had
-taken a good meal from the pile of beef on the wagon, that could not
-last very long.
-
-So, after the second night Tamba began to prowl about in the hold of
-the ship, looking for something to eat. He caught some big rats and ate
-them, and if the men who owned the ship had known that they would have
-been glad. For rats on ships do much damage, and eat some of the cargo.
-So Tamba ate the rats, but they were hardly enough. He wanted more.
-
-Then, one day he got a meal very unexpectedly. One of the sailors, who,
-perhaps, was as hungry as Tamba, took a big piece of meat from the
-“galley,” as the kitchen on a ship is called. And the sailor, who had
-no right to take this meat, stole away to eat it all by himself, so the
-cook wouldn’t see him and scold him.
-
-And, as it happened, the sailor picked out the same hold in which Tamba
-was hiding to come to eat his bit of meat which had been taken from the
-galley.
-
-Now Tamba was very hungry just about that time, and when the sailor
-happened to sit down on a barrel, behind which Tamba was hiding, and
-began to eat the meat, the tame tiger smelled it. The tiger very much
-wanted some for himself.
-
-Tamba peered out and saw the sailor sitting with the big chunk of
-cooked meat on the barrel beside him.
-
-“That’s more than he needs,” thought Tamba, after the sailor had eaten
-a bit. “I’ll take the rest. I don’t believe he’ll mind.”
-
-So Tamba reached up his paw, hooked his sharp claws into the meat, and
-pulled it down toward his hungry mouth. The sailor turned just in time
-to see his meat sliding off the barrel.
-
-“Here! Come back with that!” he yelled. “Sure, the rats are getting
-very bold when they reach up and take your meat that way! Come back
-with it!”
-
-The sailor leaned over the edge of the barrel, really thinking some
-bold rat had taken his meat, and then the sailor saw Tiger Tamba, with
-his glittering, green eyes, hiding down in the snug nest, chewing the
-meat.
-
-“Oh, my! Oh, what do I see!” cried the frightened sailor. “Oh, ’tis a
-live tiger! Well, it serves me right for taking meat I’d no business to
-take! Oh, the tiger! The tiger!” and, shouting and yelling in fright,
-the sailor ran up on deck and never went down there again.
-
-He did not dare tell the other sailors what he had seen, for then he
-would have had to tell about taking the meat, and he did not want to do
-this.
-
-As no one but the frightened sailor knew that Tamba was on the ship,
-and this sailor was not quite sure himself, Tamba was not found out.
-The chunk of meat he took away from the sailor was rather large, and it
-saved Tamba from actually starving, though he was pretty hungry before
-the ship got across the ocean. But he managed to catch some big rats
-every day, and this helped out.
-
-Aside from this, and the trick he played on the sailor, Tamba did not
-have many adventures on the ship. He had to keep pretty closely to the
-dark hold, not daring to come out.
-
-Then one day the pitching and tossing came to an end. The ship reached
-the end of her voyage and was tied up at a dock, this time in far-off
-India. Tamba was very lucky that he had gotten on a vessel that took
-him right back to his own jungle-land, though he was still many miles
-from the place of the trees and tangled vines.
-
-The night after the ship was tied up at the dock in India, Tamba
-watched his chance, and, when it was dark and quiet, he slipped up
-on deck from the dark hold, and looked about. He could see trees and
-houses, but there were not so many houses as in New York, and there
-were more trees. The air, too, had a different smell. It had more the
-smell of the jungle, and as Tamba sniffed it he said:
-
-“My home can not be so very far away now. I will run down off this ship
-and find my jungle, and also my father and mother and my sister and
-brother. Then I shall be happy. No more circus for me!”
-
-So down the same gangplank up which he had walked from the dock in New
-York, Tamba ran, and soon he was on the Indian wharf. There were boxes
-and barrels there, too, but Tamba did not stop to find a hiding place.
-He wanted to run off to the jungle as soon as he could.
-
-The tiger was hungry, so he sniffed about until he found a place where
-the ship’s cook had thrown overboard, on the dock, some scraps of meat
-to some hungry dogs. The dogs had not eaten it all, and there was a
-little left for Tamba. Then, when he had found a drink of water at a
-fountain in a street near the dock, Tamba was ready to set off on his
-journey to find his former jungle home.
-
-It was a warm, Indian night. There was no moon, and as there were not
-many lights near the dock, Tamba was not seen as he slunk off the ship
-and began to travel. He sniffed the warm, moist air, and it reminded
-him of his jungle home. He remembered it from the time when he had been
-a little, baby tiger.
-
-[Illustration: Tamba ran and soon he was on the Indian wharf.]
-
-“Ah, that is good!” thought Tamba. “It was nice in the circus, and I
-had many good friends――Tum Tum, Dido, Chunky, the happy hippo, and
-Nero. And I met many good friends after I ran away――even Squinty was
-kind after he found I did not hurt him. But still I will like best to
-get back to my jungle.”
-
-So Tamba traveled on through the dark night, getting farther and
-farther away from the city where the ship had docked. Strange as it may
-seem, Tamba had made the trip all the way across the ocean himself. It
-was a great thing for a tiger to do, I think.
-
-Now he was in India, and that country has not so many large cities, nor
-were they as close together as in the United States, where Tamba had
-been in the circus. So, soon after leaving the dock, the tame tiger
-found himself out in the wild country. And it was not so far away to
-the jungle, though the jungle, where Tamba had formerly lived, was
-still many miles off.
-
-“But at last I am free, I am not in the circus, and I am out in the hot
-country that I love,” thought Tamba, as he slunk along under the trees
-and bushes. “Now all that I have to do is to find the right jungle. I
-can eat and drink now when I please. I shall not have to take chunks
-of meat away from sailors, nor catch rats.”
-
-In this Tamba was right. All about him, in the woods, were plenty of
-small animals on which he could feed. And there were pools of water
-here and there where he could drink. It was not like being cooped up in
-the hold of a ship, nor even like being in a circus cage. Tamba liked
-very much to be free so he could wander where he wished.
-
-He traveled on and on for many nights, hiding in the day-time when he
-came to a city or village, but slinking along through the tall grass,
-or among the trees, when he came to the open country. He grew sleek and
-fat, for he had plenty to eat. Then, too, he met other tigers and some
-lions as well as a few elephants.
-
-All these animals he asked where his former jungle cave was, but none
-of them could tell him. They did not know Tamba’s father or mother, nor
-had they ever seen his sister or brother.
-
-For many miles Tamba roamed over India, looking for his old home. He
-began to think he would never find it, and he was getting lonesome and
-homesick when, one evening, he came to the edge of a deep wood. He
-crossed a field of tall dried grass to reach the trees. He was on the
-edge of a deep, dense jungle, and, somehow, as he sniffed the air, to
-make sure there were no hunters about, and no wild beasts that might do
-him harm――somehow, Tamba felt that he had been near this same jungle
-forest once before.
-
-“But it was many years ago,” he thought. “I wonder if there is any one
-here who would know where my father and mother are.”
-
-Slowly he crossed through the dried grass and reached the woods. In
-front of him he saw a cave, and, at the sight of it, Tamba’s heart
-began to beat faster. He had a strange feeling.
-
-Out in front of the cave walked a big tiger――a man tiger. He paced
-slowly up and down, and, after a while, a tigress came out to keep him
-company. Tamba looked past the cave and saw, tumbling about in the
-dried leaves of the jungle, a boy and a girl tiger. Then he heard the
-tigress say:
-
-“Well, our children are growing up. Soon they will go away from our
-jungle cave.”
-
-“Yes, I suppose so,” said the larger man tiger, and Tamba thought the
-old tiger’s voice was sad.
-
-“Yes, they will go away,” went on the tigress. “They will leave us as
-Tamba did!”
-
-“Tamba!” thought the surprised circus tiger to himself. “She knows my
-name!”
-
-“Oh, but Tamba did not go away,” said the old man tiger. “He was
-caught in a trap. Well do I remember that night! We have never seen him
-since.”
-
-“No; and I don’t suppose we ever shall,” said the tigress, and she,
-too, spoke sadly. “I would give a great deal if I could only see my
-little Tamba again.”
-
-At that Tamba could wait no longer. Trembling with eagerness he leaped
-through the grass, and landed in front of the cave, right between the
-other tigers.
-
-“Ha! What is this? Who is this strange tiger?” asked the old one.
-
-“Yes, who are you, and what do you want?” asked the tigress. “If you
-came to play with our boy and girl, there they are rolling in the
-grass. But you should not pounce in like that. It isn’t very nice and――”
-
-“Mother! Don’t you know me?” cried Tamba, in tiger talk, of course.
-“Why, I’m your own little boy tiger who was trapped and taken away long
-ago! I have been in a circus ever since, until I ran away, got on a
-ship, and came back to my jungle. Here I am! Don’t you know me, Father?”
-
-The old tiger opened wide his eyes and peered at the younger one.
-
-“Why――why――it is Tamba!” he growled. “Look, Mother, our tiger cub has
-come back to us, almost full grown! Oh, what a fine tiger he is!
-Here!” he called to Tamba’s brother and sister. “Here is Tamba come
-back! Oh, how glad I am!”
-
-“And so am I!” cried Tamba’s mother, as she purred and rubbed him with
-her paw. “Oh, to think of having you back again after all these years!
-I am so glad!”
-
-“And I am glad to get back!” said Tamba. “I had a lot of adventures
-before I got here, though.”
-
-“Oh, do tell us about them!” purred Tamba’s sister. “I love to hear
-adventure stories.”
-
-“So do I,” said Tamba’s brother. “Tell us about the circus.”
-
-“First, let him have something to eat,” suggested Tamba’s mother. “You
-are hungry, aren’t you?” she asked.
-
-“Indeed I am,” said Tamba.
-
-Then they brought him a big chunk of meat from the cave, and when he
-had eaten that and had taken a drink from the pool Tamba sat down and
-began his story.
-
-“I have been in many places,” he said, “but, most of all, I like to be
-back in the jungle. I am never going away again!”
-
-“And to think you found us again, after all these years!” said his
-mother.
-
-“I think it is wonderful!” added his sister.
-
-“Very clever, I call it,” said his father, sort of laughing.
-
-“Oh, let Tamba tell his adventures,” begged his brother.
-
-So Tamba told them, just as I have written them here in this book. He
-told about the circus, about how Squinty splashed whitewash on him, and
-everything; and, my! the other jungle tigers laughed at the funny pig’s
-trick.
-
-It was late that night when Tamba had finished the story of his
-adventures, and then, having eaten some more, he was given a bed on the
-dried leaves in the cave, where he curled up with his father and mother
-and sister and brother.
-
-“Tamba,” asked his sister softly, as she reached over in the darkness
-and touched him with her paw, “do you think I would like it in a
-circus?”
-
-“No!” said Tamba. “You had better stay at home in the jungle. There is
-no place like it. I am glad to get back!”
-
-And then he went to sleep.
-
-
-THE END
-
-
-
-
-STORIES FOR CHILDREN
-
-(From four to nine years old)
-
-THE KNEETIME ANIMAL STORIES
-
-BY RICHARD BARNUM
-
-
-[Illustration]
-
-In all nursery literature animals have played a conspicuous part; and
-the reason is obvious for nothing entertains a child more than the
-antics of an animal. These stories abound in amusing incidents such as
-children adore and the characters are so full of life, so appealing to
-a child’s imagination, that none will be satisfied until they have met
-all of their favorites――Squinty, Slicko, Mappo, Tum Tum, etc.
-
- 1 SQUINTY, THE COMICAL PIG.
- 2 SLICKO, THE JUMPING SQUIRREL.
- 3 MAPPO, THE MERRY MONKEY.
- 4 TUM TUM, THE JOLLY ELEPHANT.
- 5 DON, A RUNAWAY DOG.
- 6 DIDO, THE DANCING BEAR.
- 7 BLACKIE, A LOST CAT.
- 8 FLOP EAR, THE FUNNY RABBIT.
- 9 TINKLE, THE TRICK PONY.
- 10 LIGHTFOOT, THE LEAPING GOAT.
- 11 CHUNKY, THE HAPPY HIPPO.
- 12 SHARP EYES, THE SILVER FOX.
- 13 NERO, THE CIRCUS LION.
- 14 TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER.
-
-_Cloth, Large 12mo, Illustrated, Per vol. 60 cents_
-
-For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price
-by the publishers.
-
- BARSE & HOPKINS
- Publishers 28 West 23rd Street New York
-
-
-
-
- Transcriber’s Notes:
-
- ――Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
-
- ――Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.
-
- ――Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Tamba, the Tame Tiger, by Richard Barnum
-
-*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER ***
-
-***** This file should be named 62505-0.txt or 62505-0.zip *****
-This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
- http://www.gutenberg.org/6/2/5/0/62505/
-
-Produced by Donald Cummings and the Online Distributed
-Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
-
-Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will
-be renamed.
-
-Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
-law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
-so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
-States without permission and without paying copyright
-royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
-of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm
-concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
-and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive
-specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this
-eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook
-for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports,
-performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given
-away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks
-not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the
-trademark license, especially commercial redistribution.
-
-START: FULL LICENSE
-
-THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
-PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
-
-To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
-distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
-(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
-Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
-Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at
-www.gutenberg.org/license.
-
-Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic works
-
-1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
-and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
-(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
-the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
-destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your
-possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
-Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
-by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the
-person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph
-1.E.8.
-
-1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be
-used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
-agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
-things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
-even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
-paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this
-agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.
-
-1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the
-Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
-of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual
-works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
-States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
-United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
-claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
-displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
-all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
-that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting
-free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm
-works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
-Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily
-comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
-same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when
-you share it without charge with others.
-
-1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
-what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
-in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
-check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
-agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
-distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
-other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no
-representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
-country outside the United States.
-
-1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
-
-1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
-immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear
-prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work
-on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the
-phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed,
-performed, viewed, copied or distributed:
-
- This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
- most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no
- restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it
- under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
- eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the
- United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you
- are located before using this ebook.
-
-1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is
-derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
-contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
-copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
-the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
-redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project
-Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
-either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
-obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm
-trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
-
-1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
-with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
-must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
-additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
-will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works
-posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
-beginning of this work.
-
-1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
-License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
-work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
-
-1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
-electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
-prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
-active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
-Gutenberg-tm License.
-
-1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
-compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
-any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
-to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format
-other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official
-version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site
-(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
-to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
-of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain
-Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the
-full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
-
-1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
-performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
-unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
-
-1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
-access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
-provided that
-
-* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
- the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
- you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
- to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has
- agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
- Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
- within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
- legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
- payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
- Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
- Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
- Literary Archive Foundation."
-
-* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
- you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
- does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
- License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
- copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
- all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm
- works.
-
-* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
- any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
- electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
- receipt of the work.
-
-* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
- distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
-
-1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than
-are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
-from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The
-Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm
-trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
-
-1.F.
-
-1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
-effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
-works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
-Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
-contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
-or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
-intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
-other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
-cannot be read by your equipment.
-
-1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
-of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
-Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
-Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
-liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
-fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
-LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
-PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
-TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
-LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
-INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
-DAMAGE.
-
-1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
-defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
-receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
-written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
-received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
-with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
-with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
-lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
-or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
-opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
-the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
-without further opportunities to fix the problem.
-
-1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
-in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO
-OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
-LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
-
-1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
-warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
-damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
-violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
-agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
-limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
-unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
-remaining provisions.
-
-1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
-trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
-providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in
-accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
-production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
-including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
-the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
-or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or
-additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any
-Defect you cause.
-
-Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
-
-Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
-electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
-computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
-exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
-from people in all walks of life.
-
-Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
-assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
-goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
-remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
-Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
-and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future
-generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
-Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
-Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at
-www.gutenberg.org
-
-
-
-Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
-
-The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
-501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
-state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
-Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
-number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
-Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
-U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
-
-The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the
-mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its
-volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous
-locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt
-Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to
-date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and
-official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact
-
-For additional contact information:
-
- Dr. Gregory B. Newby
- Chief Executive and Director
- gbnewby@pglaf.org
-
-Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
-Literary Archive Foundation
-
-Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
-spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
-increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
-freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
-array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
-($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
-status with the IRS.
-
-The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
-charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
-States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
-considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
-with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
-where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
-DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular
-state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate
-
-While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
-have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
-against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
-approach us with offers to donate.
-
-International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
-any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
-outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
-
-Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
-methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
-ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
-donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate
-
-Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works.
-
-Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
-Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be
-freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
-distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of
-volunteer support.
-
-Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
-editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
-the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
-necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
-edition.
-
-Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search
-facility: www.gutenberg.org
-
-This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
-including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
-Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
-subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
-
diff --git a/old/62505-0.zip b/old/62505-0.zip
deleted file mode 100644
index fef595e..0000000
--- a/old/62505-0.zip
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h.zip b/old/62505-h.zip
deleted file mode 100644
index c2b6aad..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h.zip
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/62505-h.htm b/old/62505-h/62505-h.htm
deleted file mode 100644
index 4e61bf2..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/62505-h.htm
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,4759 +0,0 @@
-<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
- "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
-<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en">
- <head>
- <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" />
- <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" />
-
- <title>
- Tamba, the Tame Tiger, by Richard Barnum—A Project Gutenberg eBook
- </title>
-
- <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" />
-
- <style type="text/css">
-
-/* DACSoft styles */
-
-body {
- margin-left: 10%;
- margin-right: 10%;
-}
-
-/* General headers */
-h1 {
- text-align: center; /* all headings centered */
- clear: both;
-}
-
-/* Chapter headers */
-h2 {
- text-align: center;
- font-weight: bold;
- line-height: 1.5em;
-}
-
-div.chapter {
- page-break-before: always;
-}
-
-h2.nobreak {
- page-break-before: avoid;
-}
-
-/* Indented paragraph */
-p {
- margin-top: .51em;
- margin-bottom: .49em;
- text-align: justify;
- text-indent: 1em;
-}
-
-/* Unindented paragraph */
-.noi { text-indent: 0em; }
-
-/* Centered unindented paragraph */
-.noic {
- text-indent: 0em;
- text-align: center;
-}
-
-/* Drop caps */
-p.cap { text-indent: 0em; }
-
-p.cap:first-letter {
- float: left;
- padding-right: 3px;
- font-size: 250%;
- line-height: 83%;
-}
-
-/* Non-standard paragraph margins */
-.p2 { margin-top: 2em; }
-.p4 { margin-top: 4em; }
-
-/* Horizontal rules */
-hr {
- width: 33%;
- margin-top: 2em;
- margin-bottom: 2em;
- margin-left: 33.5%;
- margin-right: 33.5%;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;}
-
-hr.r20 {
- width: 20%;
- margin-left: 40%;
- margin-right: 40%;
- margin-top: 1em;
- margin-bottom: 1em;
-}
-
-/* Lists */
-ol {list-style-position: outside;}
-
-ul { list-style-type: none; }
-
-li {
- text-indent: 0em;
- padding-left: 0em;
-}
-
-/* Tables */
-table {
- margin-left: auto;
- margin-right: auto;
-}
-
-/* Table cell alignments */
-.tdl {text-align: left;}
-
-.tdrb {
- text-align: right;
- vertical-align: bottom;
-}
-
-.tdrt {
- text-align: right;
- padding-right: 0.75em;
- vertical-align: top;
-}
-
-th {
- font-weight: normal;
-}
-
-/* Physical book page and line numbers */
-.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */
- /* visibility: hidden; */
- position: absolute;
- right: 3%;
-/* left: 92%; */
- font-size: x-small;
- font-style: normal;
- font-weight: normal;
- font-variant: normal;
- text-align: right;
- color: gray;
-} /* page numbers */
-
-/* Text appearance */
-.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;}
-
-/* Small fonts and lowercase small-caps */
-.smfont {
- font-size: .8em;
-}
-
-.smfontr {
- font-size: .75em;
- text-align: right;
-}
-
-/* Illustration caption */
-.caption {
- font-size: .75em;
- font-weight: bold;
-}
-
-/* Images */
-img {
- max-width: 100%; /* no image to be wider than screen or containing div */
- height:auto; /* keep height in proportion to width */
-}
-
-.figcenter {
- margin: auto;
- text-align: center;
- max-width: 90%; /* div no wider than screen, even when screen is narrow */
-}
-
-.figleft {
- float: left;
- clear: left;
- margin-left: 0;
- margin-bottom: 1em;
- margin-top: 1em;
- margin-right: 1em;
- padding: 0;
- text-align: center;
-/* max-width: XX%; */
-}
-
-@media handheld {
-.figleft {
- float: left;
- margin: 1.5em;
- text-align: center;
- }
-}
-
-/* Transcriber's notes */
-.tnote {
- background-color: #E6E6FA;
- margin-left: 10%;
- margin-right: 10%;
- padding-bottom: .5em;
- padding-top: .5em;
- padding-left: .5em;
- padding-right: .5em;
-}
-
-.tntitle {
- font-size: 1.25em;
- font-weight: bold;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-/* Title page borders and content. */
-.title {
- font-size: 1.75em;
- font-weight: bold;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-.subtitle {
- font-size: 1.5em;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-.author {
- font-size: 1.25em;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-.works {
- font-size: .75em;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-/* Advertisement formatting. */
-.adpage {
- margin-left: 15%;
- margin-right: 15%;
-}
-
-.adbox {
- border: 2px solid black;
- padding-left: 1em;
- padding-right: 1em;
- margin: auto;
- width: 20em;
-}
-
-@media handheld {
-
- .adpage {
- margin-left: auto;
- margin-right: auto;
- }
-
- .adbox {
- border: 2px solid black;
- padding: 1em;
- margin: auto;
- max-width: 100%;
- }
-}
-
-.adgroup {
- font-size: 1.25em;
- font-weight: bold;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-.adtitle {
- font-size: 1.5em;
- font-weight: bold;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-.adauthor {
- font-size: 1.25em;
- text-align: center;
- clear: both;
-}
-
-/* Hanging indent. */
-.hang {
- text-indent: -2em;
- padding-left: 3em;
-}
-
- </style>
- </head>
-<body>
-
-
-<pre>
-
-The Project Gutenberg EBook of Tamba, the Tame Tiger, by Richard Barnum
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-Title: Tamba, the Tame Tiger
- His Many Adventures
-
-Author: Richard Barnum
-
-Illustrator: Walter S. Rogers
-
-Release Date: June 28, 2020 [EBook #62505]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Donald Cummings and the Online Distributed
-Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
-
-
-
-
-
-
-</pre>
-
-
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="cover">
- <img src="images/cover.jpg" alt="cover" title="cover" />
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_frontis">
- <img src="images/i_frontis.jpg" alt="" title="" />
- <br />
- <div class="caption"><a href="#Page_94">Tamba ran for what he thought was the doorway of a cave.</a></div>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-<p class="noi subtitle"><i>Kneetime Animal Stories</i></p>
-
-<h1>TAMBA<br />
-THE TAME TIGER</h1>
-
-<p class="noi subtitle">HIS MANY ADVENTURES</p>
-
-<p class="p2 noic">BY</p>
-
-<p class="noi author">RICHARD BARNUM</p>
-
-<p class="noi works">Author of “Squinty, the Comical Pig,” “Tum Tum,<br />
-the Jolly Elephant,” “Chunky, the Happy Hippo,”<br />
-“Sharp Eyes, the Silver Fox,” “Nero, the<br />
-Circus Lion,” etc.</p>
-
-<p class="p4 noi works"><i>ILLUSTRATED BY</i></p>
-
-<p class="noic"><i>WALTER S. ROGERS</i></p>
-
-<p class="p4 noic">NEW YORK<br />
-<span class="noi adauthor">BARSE &amp; HOPKINS</span><br />
-PUBLISHERS</p>
-
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-<div class="adbox">
-<p class="noi author">KNEETIME ANIMAL STORIES</p>
-
-<p class="noic">By Richard Barnum</p>
-
-<p class="noic"><i>Large 12mo. Illustrated.</i></p>
-
-<ul>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Squinty, The Comical Pig.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Slicko, The Jumping Squirrel.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Mappo, The Merry Monkey.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Tum Tum, The Jolly Elephant.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Don, A Runaway Dog.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Dido, The Dancing Bear.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Blackie, A Lost Cat.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Flop Ear, The Funny Rabbit.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Tinkle, The Trick Pony.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Lightfoot, The Leaping Goat.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Chunky, The Happy Hippo.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Sharp Eyes, The Silver Fox.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Nero, The Circus Lion.</span></li>
-<li class="hang"><span class="smcap">Tamba, The Tame Tiger.</span></li>
-</ul>
-
-<p class="noic">BARSE &amp; HOPKINS<br />
-Publishers            New York</p>
-</div>
-
-<p class="p2 noic">Copyright, 1919,<br />
-by<br />
-Barse &amp; Hopkins</p>
-
-<hr class="r20" />
-
-<p class="noic"><i>Tamba, the Tame Tiger</i></p>
-
-<p class="p4 noi works">VAIL·BALLOU COMPANY<br />
-BINGHAMTON AND NEW YORK</p>
-
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-<h2>CONTENTS</h2>
-
-
-<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" summary="Contents">
-<col style="width: 20%;" />
-<col style="width: 70%;" />
-<col style="width: 10%;" />
-<tr>
- <th class="smfontr">CHAPTER</th>
- <th class="tdl"></th>
- <th class="smfontr">PAGE</th>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">I</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">Tamba is Cross</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">7</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">II</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">Tamba’s Funny Trick</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">17</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">III</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">Tamba Plays a Joke</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">26</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">IV</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">Tamba in a Wreck</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">34</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">V</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">Tamba in a Barn</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">45</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">VI</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">Tamba Meets Tinkle</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">53</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">VII</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">Tamba and Squinty</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">65</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">VIII</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">Tamba in the City</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">74</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">IX</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">Tamba in the Subway</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">84</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">X</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">Tamba at the Dock</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">95</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">XI</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">Tamba on the Ship</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">106</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdrt">XII</td>
- <td class="tdl smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">Tamba in the Jungle</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">113</td>
-</tr>
-</table>
-
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS</h2>
-
-
-<table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" summary="Illustrations">
-<col style="width: 80%;" />
-<col style="width: 20%;" />
-<tr>
- <td class="tdl hang"><a href="#i_frontis">Tamba ran for what he thought was the doorway
-of a cave</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb"><i>Frontispiece</i></td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <th class="tdl hang">&nbsp;</th>
- <th class="smfontr">PAGE</th>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdl hang"><a href="#i_p023">And into his mouth it would go</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">22</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdl hang"><a href="#i_p043">Off slid the tiger cage</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">42</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdl hang"><a href="#i_p057">He dropped his basket</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">56</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdl hang"><a href="#i_p077">The whitewash splashed out and splattered on
-the tame tiger</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">76</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdl hang"><a href="#i_p099">But the man was asleep and did not see the tiger</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">98</td>
-</tr>
-<tr>
- <td class="tdl hang"><a href="#i_p119">Tamba ran and soon he was on the Indian wharf</a></td>
- <td class="tdrb">118</td>
-</tr>
-</table>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_7"></a>[7]</span></p>
-
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p class="noi title">TAMBA,<br />
-THE TAME TIGER</p>
-
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I<br />
-<small>TAMBA IS CROSS</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">“Here! Don’t you do that again, or
-I’ll scratch you!”</p>
-
-<p>“I didn’t do anything, Tamba.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, you did! You stuck your tail into my
-cage, and if you do it again I’ll step on it!
-Burr-r-r-r!”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba, the tame tiger, looked out between the
-iron bars of the big circus-wagon cage where he
-lived and glared at Nero, the lion who was next
-door to him. Their cages were close together
-in the circus tent, and Nero, pacing up and down
-in his, had, accidentally, let his long, tufted tail
-slip between the bars of the cage where Tamba
-was.</p>
-
-<p>“Take your tail out of my cage!” growled
-Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, certainly! Of course I will!” said
-Nero, and though he could roar very loudly at<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_8"></a>[8]</span>
-times, he now spoke in a very gentle voice indeed;
-that is, for a lion. Of course both Tamba
-and Nero were talking in animal language, just
-as your dog and cat talk to one another, by mewing
-and barking.</p>
-
-<p>“My goodness!” rumbled Tum Tum, the jolly
-elephant of the circus, as he turned to speak to
-Chunky, the happy hippo, who was taking a bath
-in his tank of water near the camels. “My
-goodness! Tamba is very cross to-day. I wonder
-what the matter is with our tame tiger.”</p>
-
-<p>“He isn’t very tame just now,” said Dido, the
-dancing bear, who did funny tricks on top of a
-wooden platform strapped to Tum Tum’s back.
-“I call him rather wild!”</p>
-
-<p>“So he is; but don’t let him hear you say it,”
-whispered Tum Tum through his trunk. “It
-might make him all the crosser.”</p>
-
-<p>“Here! What’s that you’re saying about
-me?” suddenly asked Tamba. He came over to
-the side of his cage nearest Tum Tum. “I
-heard you talking about me,” went on the tame
-tiger, who was beautifully striped with yellow
-and black. “I heard you, and I don’t like it!”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, then you shouldn’t be so cross,” said
-Tum Tum. He was not at all afraid of Tamba,
-as some of the smaller circus animals—such as
-the monkeys and little Shetland ponies—were.
-“You spoke very unkindly to Nero just now,”<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_9"></a>[9]</span>
-went on Tum Tum. “And, really, if his tail did
-slip in between the bars of your cage, that didn’t
-hurt anything, did it?”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba, the tame tiger, sort of hung his head.
-He was a bit ashamed of himself, as he had good
-reason to be.</p>
-
-<p>“We ought to be kind to one another—we circus
-animals,” went on Tum Tum. “Here we
-are, a good way from our jungle homes, most of
-us. And though we like it here in the circus,
-still we can’t help but think, sometimes, of how
-we used to run about as we pleased in the woods
-and the fields. So we ought to be nice to each
-other here.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, that’s right,” agreed Tamba. “I’m
-sorry I was cross to you, Nero. You can put
-your tail in my cage as much as you want.”</p>
-
-<p>“I don’t want to!” growled the big lion. “My
-own cage is plenty good enough for me, thank
-you. I can switch my tail around in my own
-cage as much as I please.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, don’t talk that way,” said Tum Tum.
-“Now that Tamba has said he is sorry, Nero,
-you ought to be nice, too.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” went on Tamba. “Come on, Nero.
-Put your tail in my cage. I won’t scratch it or
-step on it. I’m sorry I was cross. But really I
-am so homesick for my jungle, and my foot hurts
-me so, that I don’t know what I’m saying.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_10"></a>[10]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Your foot hurts you!” exclaimed the big lion
-in surprise. “Why, I didn’t know that. I’m
-sorry! Did some one shoot you in your paw as
-I was once shot in the jungle? I didn’t hear any
-gun go off, except the make-believe ones the
-funny clown shoots.”</p>
-
-<p>“No, I am not shot in my foot,” answered
-Tamba. “But I ran a big sliver from the bottom
-of my cage in it, and it hurts like anything!
-I can hardly step on it.”</p>
-
-<p>“Poor Tamba! No wonder you’re cross!”
-said the lion, in a purring sort of voice, for lions
-and tigers can purr just as your cat can, only
-much more loudly, of course. “How did you
-get the sliver in your paw?” Nero went on.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, I was jumping about in my cage, doing
-some of the new tricks my trainer is teaching me,
-and I jumped on the sharp piece of wood. I
-didn’t see the splinter sticking up, and now my
-paw is very sore,” replied Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, lick it well with your red tongue,” advised
-Nero. “That’s what I did when the
-hunter man in my jungle shot the bullet into my
-paw. Perhaps your foot will get better soon.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, I suppose it will,” admitted Tamba.
-“But then I want to go back to the jungle to live,
-and I can’t. I don’t like it in the circus any
-more. I want to go to the jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I don’t believe you’ll ever get there,”<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_11"></a>[11]</span>
-said Nero. “Here you are in the circus, and
-here you must stay.”</p>
-
-<p>It was just after the afternoon performance in
-the circus tent, and the animals were resting or
-eating until it should be time for the evening
-entertainment. It was while they were waiting
-that Nero’s tail had slipped into Tamba’s cage
-and Tamba had become cross.</p>
-
-<p>But now the striped tiger was sorry he had
-acted so. He curled up in the corner of his cage
-and began to lick his sore paw, as Nero had told
-him to do. That is the only way animals have
-of doctoring themselves—that and letting water
-run on the sore place. And there was no running
-water in Tamba’s cage just then.</p>
-
-<p>“So our tame tiger wants to go back to his jungle,
-does he?” asked Tum Tum of Nero, when
-they saw that the striped animal had quieted
-down.</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, I guess he is getting homesick,” said
-Nero in a low voice, so Tamba would not hear
-him. “But his jungle is far, far away.”</p>
-
-<p>“Did Tamba live in the same jungle with you,
-Nero?” asked one of the monkeys who were
-jumping about in their cage.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, no,” answered the big lion. “I came
-from Africa, and there are no tigers there.
-Tamba came from India. I’ve never been
-there, but I think the Indian jungle is almost as<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_12"></a>[12]</span>
-far away as mine is in Africa. Tamba will
-never get there. He had much better stay in the
-circus and be as happy as he can.”</p>
-
-<p>But Tamba did not think so, and, as he curled
-up in his cage, he looked at the iron bars and
-wondered if they would ever break so he could
-get out and run away.</p>
-
-<p>“For that’s what I’m going to do if ever I get
-the chance!” thought Tamba. “I’m going to
-run back to my jungle!”</p>
-
-<p>As he licked his sore paw, Tamba thought of
-his happy home in the Indian jungle. He had
-lived in a big stone cave, well hidden by trees,
-bushes and tangled vines. In the same cave
-were his father and mother and his brother and
-sister tigers. Tamba had been caught in a trap
-when a small tiger, and brought away from India
-in a ship. Then he had been put in a circus,
-where he had lived ever since.</p>
-
-<p>Just before the time for the evening show some
-of the animal men, or trainers, came into the tent
-where the cages of Tamba, Nero and the other
-jungle beasts were standing.</p>
-
-<p>“Something is the matter with Tamba,” said
-one of the keepers.</p>
-
-<p>“What do you mean?” asked the man who
-took care of Nero. “Did Tamba try to bite you
-or scratch you?”</p>
-
-<p>“No; but he isn’t acting right. He doesn’t do<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_13"></a>[13]</span>
-his tricks as well as he used to. I think something
-is the matter with one of his paws. I’m
-going to have a look to-morrow.”</p>
-
-<p>Of course Tamba did not understand what the
-circus men were saying. He knew a little man-talk,
-such as: “Get up on your stool!” “Stand
-on your hind legs!” “Jump through the hoop!”</p>
-
-<p>These were the things Tamba’s trainer said to
-him when he wanted the tame tiger to do his
-tricks. But, though Tamba did not know what
-the men were saying, he guessed that they were
-talking about him, for they stood in front of his
-cage and looked at him. One of the men—the
-one who put Tamba through his circus tricks—put
-out his hand and touched, gently enough, the
-sore paw of Tamba. The tiger sprang up and
-growled fiercely, though he did not try to claw
-his kind trainer.</p>
-
-<p>“There! See what I told you!” said the man.
-“That paw is sore, and that’s what makes Tamba
-so cross. I’ll have to get the doctor to look at
-him.”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba did not do his tricks at all well that
-evening in the circus tent, and no wonder.
-Every time he jumped on his sore paw, the one
-with the splinter in it, he felt a great pain. And
-when the time came for him to leap through a
-paper hoop, as some of the clowns leap when
-they are riding around the circus rings on the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_14"></a>[14]</span>
-backs of horses, why, Tamba just wouldn’t do it!
-He turned away and curled up in the corner of
-his cage.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, how I wish I were back in my Indian
-jungle!” thought poor, sick, lonesome Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, there’s no use trying to make that tiger
-do tricks to-night,” said the man who went in the
-cage with Tamba. “Something is wrong. I
-will look at his foot.”</p>
-
-<p>And that night, after the show was over, the
-animal doctor came to the tiger’s cage. They
-tied Tamba with ropes, so he could not scratch
-or bite, and they pulled his paw—the sore one—outside
-the bars.</p>
-
-<p>And then Tamba had an unhappy time. For
-suddenly he felt a very sharp pain in his paw.
-That was when the doctor cut out the splinter
-with a knife. Tamba howled and growled and
-whined. The pain was very bad, but pretty soon
-the men, who were as kind to him as they could
-be, put some salve on the sore place, took off the
-ropes and let Tamba curl up in the corner of his
-cage again.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, how my foot hurts!” thought Tamba.
-“It is worse than before! I don’t like this circus
-at all! I’m going to break out and run away
-the first chance I get! I’m going back to my
-jungle!”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba did not know that now his paw would<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_15"></a>[15]</span>
-get well, since the splinter had been taken out.</p>
-
-<p>Night came. The circus began to move on
-toward the next town, and Tamba was tossed
-about in his cage. He could not sleep very
-much. But in a few days his paw was much
-better. During the time he was recovering he
-did not have to do any tricks. All he had to do
-was to stay in his cage and eat and sleep and let
-the boys and girls, and the grown folk, too, look
-at him when they came to the circus.</p>
-
-<p>But, all the while, Tamba was trying to think
-of a way to get loose and run back to his Indian
-jungle. And one night he thought he had his
-chance.</p>
-
-<p>The circus was going along a country road,
-from one town to another, and, as it was hot, the
-wooden sides of the animal cages had been left
-up, so Tamba, Nero and the other jungle beasts
-could look out at the stars. They were the same
-stars, some of them, that shone over the jungle.</p>
-
-<p>Suddenly there was a bright flash of light and
-a loud noise.</p>
-
-<p>“We are going to have a thunder storm,” said
-Nero, as he paced up and down in his moving
-cage.</p>
-
-<p>“It will be cooler after it, anyhow,” said Dido,
-the dancing bear. “It is very hot, now.”</p>
-
-<p>The lightning grew brighter and the thunder
-louder as the circus went up and down hill to the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_16"></a>[16]</span>
-next town. Then, suddenly, it began to rain
-very hard. The roads became muddy and slippery,
-and the horses, pulling the heavy circus
-wagons, had all they could do not to let them
-slip.</p>
-
-<p>Suddenly there was a loud crash of thunder,
-right in the midst of the circus it seemed. The
-lions and the tigers roared and growled, and the
-elephants trumpeted, while men shouted and
-yelled. There was great excitement. What
-had happened was that a big tree, at the side of
-the road, had been struck by lightning. Some
-of the circus horses were so frightened that they
-started to run away, pulling the wild animal
-cages after them.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba felt his cage rushing along very fast.
-His horses, too, were running away. Then, all
-at once, there was a great crash, and Tamba felt
-his cage turning over. Next it was upside
-down. The tiger was thrown on his back.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! Now is my chance to get away!”
-Tamba thought. “My cage will break open
-and I can get out! Now I can go back to my
-jungle!”</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_17"></a>[17]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II<br />
-<small>TAMBA’S FUNNY TRICK</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Bang! Crack! Crash! went the thunder,
-and the cage of Tamba, the tame
-tiger, as it slid along the slippery, muddy
-road, and struck a tree, made much the same
-noise, only not so loud.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba himself, inside the iron-barred cage,
-was feeling much better than when he had had
-the sliver in his paw. His foot was almost well
-now, and he could step on it, though he limped a
-little.</p>
-
-<p>“When my cage goes to smash I’ll slip out and
-run away,” thought Tamba. “I’m going to have
-lots of fun when I get back to my jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>Over and over rolled the cage, for the horses
-had broken loose from it and were running away.
-Many other of the circus animal cages were being
-broken in the storm.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba’s cage struck one tree, bounced away
-from that and hit another. Then it came to a
-stop, and Tamba, who had been rolling about inside,
-being sometimes on his head and sometimes
-on his feet, and again turning somersaults—Tamba,
-at last, found himself quiet.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_18"></a>[18]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Now is my chance to get away!” thought the
-tame tiger, who wanted to be wild again and live
-in a jungle. “Now I’ll get out of my cage!”</p>
-
-<p>He surely thought the big wagon with the iron
-bars on two sides—the cage in which he traveled—had
-been broken so he could get out. But
-when he tried, he found that this was not so.
-The tiger’s cage was broken a bit, here and there,
-but it was so strong that it had held together, and
-when Tamba tried to force his way out he could
-not. He was still a circus tiger, much as he
-wanted to go to the jungle.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, this is too bad!” growled Tamba to himself,
-as he tried to break out, first through one
-side of the cage and then the other. “This is too
-bad! I thought, when the storm wrecked the
-circus, that I could get loose. Now I’ll have to
-wait for another time.”</p>
-
-<p>But if Tamba had not got out of his cage when
-the great storm came, some of the circus animals
-had. Nero, the circus lion, got loose, and he
-had many adventures before he was caught again,
-as I have told you in the book before this one.
-But Tamba had to stay in his cage.</p>
-
-<p>After a while, when the worst of the storm had
-passed, the circus men began going about, getting
-back on the road some of the cages, like that
-of Tamba, that had rolled downhill.</p>
-
-<p>“Tamba’s all right,” said a trainer, as he saw<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_19"></a>[19]</span>
-the tame tiger. “He didn’t get loose, I’m glad
-to say. I want to teach him some new, funny
-tricks, now that his paw is well again.”</p>
-
-<p>“No, Tamba didn’t get away,” remarked another
-man; “but Nero, the big lion, did. We’ll
-have to go out to hunt him.”</p>
-
-<p>When morning came, and the circus was once
-more in order—except for the broken cages and
-the animals that had gotten away—Tamba felt,
-more than ever, that he would like to be back in
-his jungle.</p>
-
-<p>“So Nero got away, did he?” thought the tame
-tiger, as he saw the lion’s broken cage, and noticed
-that Nero was no longer in it. “Well, I
-wish I were with him. Now he can go back to
-his jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>But Nero did not do that, as those of you know
-who have read the book about him. I’ll just
-say, right here, that Nero had many adventures,
-but, as this book is about Tamba, I must tell
-about him, and the adventures the tame tiger
-had.</p>
-
-<p>A few days after this, when the circus was
-traveling on again, though without Nero, who
-had not been caught, it came to a large city,
-where it was to stay nearly a week to give shows.</p>
-
-<p>“And now will be a good chance for me to
-teach Tamba some new and funny tricks,” said
-the animal man who had charge of the tiger. “I<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_20"></a>[20]</span>
-want him to make the people laugh when they
-come to the circus. The boys and girls will like
-to see Tamba do some funny tricks.”</p>
-
-<p>And the next day, his paw being again well,
-Tamba began to learn something new. When
-his trainer entered the cage, Tamba, much as he
-wanted to run away to the jungle, was glad to see
-the man. For the man was kind to the tiger, and
-patted him on the head, and gave him nice bits
-of meat to eat.</p>
-
-<p>“Now, Tamba,” said the trainer, speaking in
-a kind voice, “you are going to learn something
-new. Sit up!” he cried, and he held a little stick
-in front of Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>The tiger knew what this meant, as he had
-learned the trick some time before. When the
-trainer spoke that way he meant that Tamba was
-to sit up, just as your dog may do when you tell
-him to “beg.”</p>
-
-<p>“That’s very good,” said the man, when
-Tamba had done as he was told. “Now that is
-the first part of a new trick. Next I am going
-to put a little cracker on your nose. It isn’t
-really a cracker, it is a dog biscuit, and it has
-some meat in it. As you like meat I think you’ll
-like the dog biscuit.”</p>
-
-<p>As the man spoke he took from his pocket one
-of the square cakes called dog biscuit. I dare
-say you have often given them to your dog.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_21"></a>[21]</span>
-The animal trainer broke off a bit of this biscuit
-and put it on Tamba’s nose. Tamba could smell
-that it was good to eat, and he quickly shook his
-head a little, jiggled the piece of biscuit to the
-floor of his cage, and the next minute the piece
-of biscuit was gone. Tamba had eaten it.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, that’s what I want you to do,” said the
-man with a laugh, “but not just that way. This
-is to be one of your new, funny tricks, but you
-didn’t do it just right. I want you to hold the
-piece of biscuit on your nose until I call ‘Toss!’
-Then I want you to flip it into the air and catch
-the piece of biscuit in your mouth. Now we’ll
-try it again.”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba did the same thing he had done the
-first time, but the man was kind and patient, and,
-after many trials, Tamba at last understood what
-was wanted of him. He must hold the bit of
-dog biscuit on his nose until the man said he
-could eat it.</p>
-
-<p>Then the tiger was to give his head a little jerk.
-This would snap the bit of biscuit into the air,
-and, if Tamba opened his mouth at the right
-time, the biscuit would fall into it. That would
-be the funny trick.</p>
-
-<p>And, as I say, Tamba learned, after a while,
-how to do it just right. But it took nearly a
-week. At the end of that time his trainer could
-put a bit of dog biscuit on the tiger’s black nose.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_22"></a>[22]</span>
-Then Tamba would sit up on his hind legs, very
-still and straight, looking at his master.</p>
-
-<p>“Now!” the man would suddenly call, and
-Tamba would jerk his head, up the piece of biscuit
-would fly, <a href="#i_p023">and into his mouth it would go</a>.</p>
-
-<p>“That’s fine!” cried the man, after the second
-week, during which time Tamba had practiced
-very hard. “Now we are ready to do the new
-trick in the tent for the boys and girls.”</p>
-
-<p>And when the trick was done the boys and
-girls laughed very much and clapped their
-hands. They liked to see Tamba do his tricks.
-Nor was this the only new one he learned. His
-master taught him several others.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba would lie down and roll over when he
-was told; he would walk around on his hind legs,
-wearing a funny pointed cap; and he would turn
-a somersault, just as he had done the night his
-cage rolled downhill in the storm. All these
-tricks were much enjoyed by the boys and girls
-and by the men and women who came to the circus.
-Tamba was a very smart tiger. But, for
-all that, he never gave up the idea of running
-away when he got the chance, and going back to
-his jungle.</p>
-
-<p>All this while Nero, the circus lion, had not
-returned. He had been away since the night of
-the storm, and Tum Tum, and his other friends,
-missed Nero.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_23"></a>[23]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_p023">
- <img src="images/i_p023.jpg" alt="" title="" />
- <br />
- <div class="caption"><a href="#Page_22">And into his mouth it would go.</a></div>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_24"></a>[24-<br />25]</span></p>
-
-<p>“But he is having a much better time than we
-are, just the same,” said Tamba, as he paced back
-and forth in his cage. “He is on the way back
-to the jungle!”</p>
-
-<p>If he could have seen Nero just then he never
-would have said that. For the circus lion was
-in the kitchen of a country farmhouse watching
-a tramp eat ham, and—but there! This book is
-about Tamba, not about Nero, though I have to
-mention the lion once in a while.</p>
-
-<p>About a week after Tamba had learned to do
-several new and funny tricks, there was a sudden
-noise at the entrance of the circus animal tent.
-It was after the afternoon show had ended, and
-not yet time for the evening performance.</p>
-
-<p>“What’s the matter, Tum Tum?” asked
-Tamba, who could not see very well from his
-cage. “What has happened? Have some more
-of our animals gotten away?”</p>
-
-<p>“I think not,” answered the big elephant, who
-could see the tent entrance. “I think they are
-bringing in a new lion. Maybe he is to take the
-place of Nero. We’ll soon know. Here they
-come with him.”</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_26"></a>[26]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III<br />
-<small>TAMBA PLAYS A JOKE</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Just as Tum Tum had said, a lion’s cage was
-being wheeled into the circus animal tent,
-and in the cage was a big, tawny, yellow
-animal, which Tamba knew, at once, was a lion.</p>
-
-<p>But, to the surprise of the tame tiger and his
-friends, it was not a new lion at all, but Nero
-himself. There he was, looking almost the same
-as when he had disappeared the night of the big
-storm, the night when Tamba thought he could
-get away.</p>
-
-<p>“Why, Nero!” exclaimed the tiger, as his
-friend’s new cage was wheeled in, “where in the
-world have you been?”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, almost everywhere, I guess,” answered
-Nero. “I’ve had a lot of adventures!”</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! Then you’ll be put in a book,” said
-Tum Tum quickly. And, as those of you who
-have read the volume which comes just before
-this one know, Nero was put in a book.</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, I had adventures enough for a book,”
-went on the big lion, who had been caught by
-some circus men in a farmer’s woodshed and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_27"></a>[27]</span>
-brought back to the show. “I had a pretty good
-time, too, while I was away, though I didn’t get
-as much to eat as we do here in the circus. I
-guess I’m glad to be back, my friends!” and he
-curled up in his cage and got ready to go to
-sleep.</p>
-
-<p>“Ho! Glad to get back, are you?” asked
-Tamba. “Well, I won’t say that if I get a
-chance to run away! I’ll stay, when I go!”</p>
-
-<p>“That’s what you think now,” said Nero.
-“But really it isn’t as much fun as you’d think—running
-away isn’t.”</p>
-
-<p>“Couldn’t you find your jungle?” asked
-Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>“No,” answered Nero, “I couldn’t.”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I’ll find mine,” declared Tamba.
-“That’s why I want to run away—so I can get
-back to my jungle. And I’m going to do it,
-too!”</p>
-
-<p>Of course all this talk went on in animal language,
-and none of the circus helpers or the
-trainers could understand it. If they could,
-they might have guarded Tamba more closely.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, please don’t bother me now,” said
-Nero, as he curled his paws under his chin, just
-as your cat sometimes does when she goes to
-sleep. “I am going to have a nap after all my
-adventures and travels.”</p>
-
-<p>“All right, go to sleep,” said Tum Tum. “We<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_28"></a>[28]</span>
-won’t bother you, Nero. Only, some day, I hope
-you’ll tell us more of your adventures.”</p>
-
-<p>“I will,” promised Nero.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba, the tame tiger, paced up and down in
-his cage after Nero had gone to sleep.</p>
-
-<p>“I wish I had had his chances!” thought
-Tamba, as he looked over toward the sleeping
-Nero. “I wouldn’t have let them catch me!
-I’d have run on and on until I found my jungle,
-no matter how far away it was.”</p>
-
-<p>And then Tamba began to think of the life in
-India and of the days when he, a little tiger cub,
-was hiding in the deep, dark, green jungle. He
-thought of how he had tumbled about in the
-leaves, playing with his brother and sister, and of
-his mother sitting in the mouth, or front door,
-of the cave and watching her striped babies.</p>
-
-<p>They had learned how to walk, and how to
-jump and stick out their claws whenever they
-wanted to catch anything. Their father and
-mother had taught the little tiger cubs how to
-hunt in the jungle for the meat they had to eat.
-They could not go to the store and buy something
-when they were hungry. Tigers, and other wild
-animals, must hunt for what they eat.</p>
-
-<p>Of course, after he had been caught and sent
-to the circus, Tamba no longer had to hunt for
-his food. It was brought to him by the circus
-men, and thrust into his cage. Nor did he have<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_29"></a>[29]</span>
-to hunt for water, the way the jungle animals
-have to go sniffing and snuffing about in the forest
-to find a pool or a spring. Tamba’s water
-was brought to his cage in a tin pail, and very
-glad he was to get it.</p>
-
-<p>“But, for all that,” thought the tame tiger, as
-he paced up and down, “for all that I’d rather be
-loose and on my way back to the jungle instead
-of being cooped up here. Much as I like the
-things they give me to eat, I want to go home.
-And I’m going to get loose, too, and run away as
-Nero did. Only I won’t come back!”</p>
-
-<p>The more Tamba thought of the green jungle,
-so far away in India, the more sad, unhappy and
-discontented the tame tiger became. He did not
-do his tricks as well as he used to do, and he was
-often cross in speaking to the other circus animals.
-Sometimes he wouldn’t speak at all, but
-only growl, or maybe grumble deep down in his
-throat, and that isn’t talking at all.</p>
-
-<p>“I declare! I don’t know what’s the matter
-with Tamba,” said Tum Tum one day. “He
-doesn’t seem at all happy any more. Dido, do
-some of your funny dances and see if you can’t
-cheer up Tamba!”</p>
-
-<p>So the dancing bear did some of his tricks,
-capering about in his cage, but Tamba would
-hardly look at him. Some boys, though, who
-had come to the circus, gathered in front of the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_30"></a>[30]</span>
-bear’s cage and laughed and laughed at his funny
-antics. They liked Dido. The boys liked to
-look at Tamba, also, but they were a little afraid
-of the big, striped tiger.</p>
-
-<p>One day, when the afternoon performance was
-over, and Tamba, Nero and the other animals
-who had done their tricks in the big tent were
-brought back to the smaller one, where they were
-kept between the times of the shows, Nero said:</p>
-
-<p>“Now I am going to lie down and sleep, and
-please don’t any one wake me up. I’m tired,
-for I did a new trick to-day, and it was very hard,
-and I want to rest so I can do better in the show
-to-night. So everybody let me alone.”</p>
-
-<p>“We will,” said Tum Tum, the jolly elephant.</p>
-
-<p>Now the lion is called the “King of Beasts,”
-and in the jungle he comes pretty near to being
-that, for all the other animals, except perhaps the
-elephant, are afraid of him.</p>
-
-<p>So when a lion says he wants a thing done, it
-generally is done. Of course Nero could not
-have got out of his circus cage to make the other
-animals do what he wanted them to do, but most
-of them made up their minds that they wouldn’t
-bother him, even though they knew he couldn’t
-hurt them. Nero was still “King” in a way.</p>
-
-<p>But that day Tamba was cross. Or perhaps I
-might say he felt as though he wanted to “cut
-up.” He wanted to play some tricks, make<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_31"></a>[31]</span>
-some excitement. He wanted to do something!</p>
-
-<p>I dare say you have seen your dog or cat act
-the same way. For days at a time they may be
-very quiet, eating and sleeping and doing only
-the things they do every day. And then, all at
-once, they will begin to race about and “cut up.”
-Your dog may run away with your cap, and, no
-matter how many times you call him, he’ll just
-caper about and bark, or perhaps pretend to
-come near you and then run off again. And
-your cat may dig her claws into the carpet, jump
-up on the window sill and knock down a plant
-or a flower vase, and do all sorts of things like
-that.</p>
-
-<p>Well, this is just the way Tamba felt that day.
-He wanted to do something, and when he saw
-Nero sleeping so quietly in his cage the tame
-tiger made up his mind to play a trick on the
-lion.</p>
-
-<p>“It isn’t fair that he should sleep so nicely
-when I have to stay awake!” grumbled Tamba.
-“He can dream of the good times he had when
-he ran away and had adventures, and all I can
-think of is how much I want to go back to my
-jungle! It isn’t fair! I’m going to make Nero
-wake up! I’ll play a trick on him!”</p>
-
-<p>Of course this wasn’t right for Tamba to do,
-but circus tigers don’t always do right any more
-than boys, girls, or other animals.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_32"></a>[32]</span></p>
-
-<p>Tamba’s cage was next to that of Nero, and
-close beside it, instead of being at one end. The
-cages were left that way when they were brought
-in from the larger performing tent, after the animals
-had done their tricks. So it happened that
-Tamba could look out through the bars of his
-cage in between the bars where Nero was kept.
-And Tamba could stick his paws out through the
-bars, but he could not quite reach over to the
-sleeping lion.</p>
-
-<p>“If I could reach him,” said Tamba to himself,
-“I’d tickle him and wake him up. I
-wouldn’t let him sleep!”</p>
-
-<p>But Tamba’s paws were not quite long enough
-to reach through the bars of the two cages.
-Again and again the tiger tried it, but he could
-not manage.</p>
-
-<p>Then Tamba sat down on his haunches and
-looked at the sleeping Nero. At last a tricky
-idea came to Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha!” exclaimed the tiger. “If I can’t reach
-him with my paws I can reach him with my tail!
-That’s what I’ll do! I’ll reach in between the
-bars with my long, slender tail, and I’ll tickle
-Nero on the nose!”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba sort of laughed to himself as he
-thought of this trick. And he had no sooner
-thought of it than he began to try it. He turned
-about, so his back was toward Nero. Standing<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_33"></a>[33]</span>
-thus, Tamba’s long, slender tail easily reached
-into Nero’s cage. Nearer and nearer the tip of
-Tamba’s tail came to the big black nose of the
-sleeping lion.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba looked sideways over his back to see
-where to put his tail. At last the fuzzy tip-end
-of it touched Nero’s nose and tickled it. The
-big lion twitched in his sleep, just as your cat
-does, if you lightly touch one of her ears.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! I’ve found a good way to play a trick
-on Nero!” laughed Tamba. “I’ll keep on tickling
-him!”</p>
-
-<p>He waved his tail to and fro, Tamba did, and
-once again he let the tip of it touch Nero’s nose.
-The sleeping lion raised his paw, and brushed it
-over his face. He must have thought some bug
-was crawling on his nose.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, this is lots of fun!” thought Tamba. So
-it was, for him. But was it fun for Nero?</p>
-
-<p>“Now for a good tickle!” thought Tamba, as,
-once again, he put his tail over toward the sleeping
-lion’s nose. And this time something was
-going to happen.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_34"></a>[34]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV<br />
-<small>TAMBA IN A WRECK</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Down on the black nose of the sleeping
-lion went the soft, fuzzy tip of Tamba’s
-tail. And Tamba tickled Nero so hard
-that the lion gave a big sneeze and awakened
-with a jump.</p>
-
-<p>Then Nero threw himself against the bars of
-his cage until they shook where they were fastened
-into the wood, and the lion roared in his
-loudest voice:</p>
-
-<p>“Where’s that fly? Where’s the tickling fly
-that wouldn’t let me sleep? If I catch that fly
-I’ll tickle him!” and Nero roared so loudly that
-the ground seemed to tremble, as it always does
-near a lion when he roars. I have often felt it
-in the zoölogical park where I sometimes go to
-look at the lions and the tigers.</p>
-
-<p>“Where’s that fly? Where’s that fly?” roared
-Nero. For you see he thought the tickling tip
-of Tamba’s tail was a fly on his nose.</p>
-
-<p>“What’s the matter here? What’s the trouble?”
-cried one of the circus men, as he ran into
-the animal tent, having heard Nero roar.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_35"></a>[35]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Are some of the lions or tigers trying to get
-loose?” asked another man.</p>
-
-<p>“No, it seems to be Nero,” replied the first.
-“What’s the matter, old boy?” he asked, as he
-saw how angry Nero was. For the lion was
-lashing his tail from side to side and roaring:</p>
-
-<p>“Where’s that fly? Where’s that fly?”</p>
-
-<p>Of course the circus men didn’t know exactly
-what Nero was saying, but they could tell he was
-angry, and they were afraid, if he bounded
-against the bars of his cage much more, he might
-break some.</p>
-
-<p>“I don’t see what makes Nero act that way,”
-said the man who had charge of the lion, and
-who had taught him to do tricks. “Once before
-he acted like this, but it was when a bee stung
-him on the nose.”</p>
-
-<p>“Maybe that is what happened this time,” said
-the second man.</p>
-
-<p>“I don’t see any bees flying around,” went on
-the lion’s keeper. Just then Tamba, seeing that
-he had awakened Nero, and had played all the
-tricks he wanted to, pulled his tail out from between
-the bars of the lion’s cage. And, just as
-he did so, the keeper saw him.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, ho! I know what the matter was,” the
-man said. “The tiger tickled the lion. Tamba
-tickled Nero with his tail through the bars of the
-cage. That’s what made Nero angry. Tamba,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_36"></a>[36]</span>
-you’re a bad, mischievous tiger!” and he shook
-his finger at the striped animal. Tamba walked
-over to the corner of his cage and curled up.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I had some fun, anyhow!” he thought.
-“I waked Nero up all right!”</p>
-
-<p>And so he had. And now Nero knew what
-had happened, for Tum Tum, the jolly elephant,
-had seen it all, and Tum Tum said:</p>
-
-<p>“It wasn’t a fly on the end of your nose, Nero;
-it was the fuzzy tip of Tamba’s tail. I saw him
-tickle you!”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, you did, did you?” cried Nero, and this
-time he did not roar. “Why did you tickle me,
-Tamba?”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, I didn’t like to see you sleeping so nicely
-when I couldn’t sleep, because I’m thinking so
-much of the jungle,” answered the tiger. “Besides,
-it was only a joke. I wanted to see if I
-could make you think my tail was a fly on your
-nose. I did.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, you surely did,” admitted Nero. “I felt
-the tickle, even in my sleep. But if it was only a
-joke, Tamba, I won’t be angry. I like a joke as
-well as any one,” and Nero laughed in his lionish
-way. “But, after this, I’m going to sleep in
-the far corner of my cage, where your tail won’t
-reach me. A joke is all right, but sleep is better.
-Now it will be my turn to play a joke on you,
-Tamba.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_37"></a>[37]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” said Dido, the dancing bear, “you want
-to look out for yourself, Tamba. A joke is a
-joke on both sides.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, well, I don’t care,” said Tamba, but he
-was not as jolly about it as he might have been.</p>
-
-<p>The circus men saw that something was wrong
-between Tamba and Nero, so they moved the
-cages farther apart, and then Nero and Tamba
-could not have reached each other if their tails
-had been twice as long. And then Nero went to
-sleep, and so did Tamba, waiting for the evening
-show to start. And as Tamba slept he dreamed
-of the Indian jungle, and wished he could go
-back there.</p>
-
-<p>And soon something wonderful was going to
-happen to him.</p>
-
-<p>That night in the big tent, which was bright
-with electric lights, Tamba did his tricks—catching
-a piece of dog biscuit off his nose, leaping
-through a paper hoop, and walking around on
-his hind legs. Nero also did his tricks, one of
-which was sitting up like a begging dog on a
-sort of stool like an overturned wash tub.</p>
-
-<p>And Dido, the dancing bear, did his funny
-tricks on the wooden platform, which was
-strapped on the back of Tum Tum, the jolly elephant.
-So the boys and the girls, and the big
-folks, too, who went to the circus had lots of fun
-watching the animals.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_38"></a>[38]</span></p>
-
-<p>But, all the while, Nero was watching for a
-chance to play a trick on Tamba. And at last
-he found a way. It was three or four days after
-Tamba had tickled Nero with the tail tip, and
-the circus had traveled on a railroad to a far-distant
-town.</p>
-
-<p>In the animal tent the lions, tigers, elephants,
-monkeys and ponies had been given their dinners
-and were being watered. Tamba was taking
-a long drink from his tin of water, and wishing
-it could be turned into a jungle spring, when,
-all of a sudden:</p>
-
-<p>Splash!</p>
-
-<p>A lot of water spurted up into his face, and
-some, getting into his nose, made him sneeze.
-Then he looked and saw that a bone, off which
-all the meat had been gnawed, had come in
-through the bars of his cage and had fallen into
-his water-pan. It was the falling of the dry
-bone into the water that had made it splash
-up.</p>
-
-<p>“Who did that? Who threw that bone at
-me?” growled Tamba. “Who made it splash
-water all over me?”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, I guess I did that,” said Nero with a
-loud, rumbling lionish laugh. “I wanted to see
-if I could toss it from my cage into yours,
-Tamba, and I did. So the water splashed on
-you, did it?”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_39"></a>[39]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Yes, it did! You know it did!” growled
-Tamba. “It made me sneeze, too!”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, did it?” asked Nero. “Well, that was
-just a little joke of mine, my tiger friend. I
-wanted to see if I could tickle your nose the way
-you tickled mine with your tail. It was only a
-joke, splashing water on your nose. Only a
-joke! Ha! Ha! Ha!”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, it was only a joke!” said Tum Tum and
-all the other animals. “Only a joke, Tamba!
-Ha! Ha! Ha!”</p>
-
-<p>Of course the striped tiger had to laugh, too,
-for really he had not been hurt, and he must
-expect to have a joke played on him after he
-had played one on Nero.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I’ll gnaw this bone after I take a
-drink,” said Tamba, as he dried his nose on his
-paw. “Much obliged to you for tossing it into
-my cage, Nero.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, you’re very welcome, I’m sure!” laughed
-the lion. “Oh, you did jump and sneeze in such
-a funny way, Tamba, when the water went up
-your nose!” and Nero laughed again, as he
-thought of it.</p>
-
-<p>And “Ha! Ha! Ha!” echoed Tum Tum.</p>
-
-<p>And so life went on for the circus animals,
-something a little different happening every day.
-Now and then Tamba played other tricks, and so
-did Nero, and the first crossness of Tamba<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_40"></a>[40]</span>
-seemed to wear off. He was still as anxious as
-ever to go to the jungle, but he did not see how
-he could get out of his cage. He watched carefully,
-every day, hoping that some time the man
-who came in to make him do his tricks would
-forget to fasten the door when he went out.</p>
-
-<p>“If he only left it open once,” thought Tamba,
-“I could slip out and run away. Then I’d go
-back to the jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>But the trainer never left the door open. Besides,
-it closed with a spring as soon as the man
-slipped out, and, quick as he was, Tamba could
-not have slipped out. However, he kept on the
-watch, always hoping that some day his chance
-would come.</p>
-
-<p>And it did. I’ll tell you all about it pretty
-soon.</p>
-
-<p>Sometimes, as I have told you, the circus went
-from town to town by the way of country roads,
-the horses pulling the big wagons with the tents
-on them and also the wagons in which the wild
-beasts were kept. It took eight or ten horses to
-pull some of the heavy wagons uphill.</p>
-
-<p>At other times the wagons would all be put
-on big railroad cars, and an engine would haul
-them over the shiny rails. This was when it was
-too far, from one town to the next, for the horses
-to pull the wagons, or for the elephants and camels
-to walk. For when the circus traveled by<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_41"></a>[41]</span>
-country road these big animals—the camels and
-elephants—always walked.</p>
-
-<p>And one night after a stormy day the circus
-wagons were loaded on the railroad cars for a
-long journey to the next city in which the show
-was to be given.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, you haven’t gone to your jungle yet, I
-see, Tamba,” said Tum Tum to the tiger. The
-big elephant was moving about, pushing the
-heavy wagons to and fro.</p>
-
-<p>“No, I haven’t gone yet,” sadly said the beautifully
-striped beast. “And, oh, how I wish I
-could get loose!”</p>
-
-<p>On through the night rumbled the long train
-of circus cars. There was no moon, and the
-stars did not shine. The night was very dark
-after the storm.</p>
-
-<p>Suddenly there were some loud whistles from
-the train engine.</p>
-
-<p>Toot! Toot! Toot! it went, and that meant
-there was danger. The engineer had seen danger
-ahead, but not in time to stop his train. One
-of the circus trains had run off the track and
-could not go on. It had come to a halt, and
-another train that was running not far behind
-the first one crashed into it.</p>
-
-<p>There was a terrible noise, a clanging of iron
-and a breaking of wood. The cars were
-smashed, and so were some of the animal cages.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_42"></a>[42]</span></p>
-
-<p>“What is it? What’s the matter? roared
-Nero.</p>
-
-<p>“We’re in a wreck!” trumpeted Tum Tum,
-the elephant, who was not quite so jolly, now.
-“The circus train is wrecked! I was in a wreck
-once before. It’s very bad! I hope none of our
-animal friends are hurt!”</p>
-
-<p>But some were, I am sorry to say, and so were
-some of the circus men.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba, the tame tiger, felt his cage slide off
-the flat car on which it had been fastened. The
-car was smashed and tossed to one side. <a href="#i_p043">Off slid
-the tiger’s cage</a>, and then it fell down the railroad
-bank and into a ditch. Tamba’s cage broke
-open, and the tiger was cut and bruised, but he
-knew that he was free. He was no longer in the
-cage.</p>
-
-<p>“At last I am out!” he cried. “Now I can run
-away to my jungle! Now I am free!”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_43"></a>[43]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_p043">
- <img src="images/i_p043.jpg" alt="" title="" />
- <div class="caption"><a href="#Page_42">Off slid the tiger cage.</a></div>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_44"></a>[44]</span></p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_45"></a>[45]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V<br />
-<small>TAMBA IN A BARN</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">With the smashed circus cars, the
-broken animal cages, with some of the
-jungle beasts, including the elephants,
-cut and bruised, with shoutings, growlings, roarings
-and tootings going on, the scene at the circus
-train wreck was a terrible one. It was no wonder
-that Tamba, the tame tiger, wanted to run
-away from it all and get to a quiet place. And
-this he did.</p>
-
-<p>He crawled out of his cage, that had been
-broken when it slipped off the smashed car, and
-gave one last look at it in the darkness.</p>
-
-<p>“Good-by, old cage!” said Tamba, softly, as he
-turned to run away. “I’ve been in you for the
-last time. I’m never coming back to the circus!”</p>
-
-<p>Leaving the noise and confusion of the circus
-wreck behind him, Tamba slunk off into the tall
-grass that grew in the fields beside the railroad
-track. The accident had happened at a lonely
-place, and there were no houses near at hand.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! This is a little like the jungle where I<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_46"></a>[46]</span>
-used to live!” thought Tamba, as he slunk
-through the tall grass. “I can hide here until I
-see which way to go to get back home.”</p>
-
-<p>And Tamba was right. The grass grew long,
-as it did in the jungle, but there were not so many
-trees and tangled vines as in India. Only at
-night it seemed a very quiet, restful place to the
-tiger who had been so shaken up in the wreck.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba walked on and on through the darkness,
-not really knowing, and not much caring,
-which way he went. All he wanted to do was to
-get away and hide, and the tall grass was just the
-place for this.</p>
-
-<p>In a little while Tamba came to a place where
-there was a small pool of water. It had leaked
-from a pipe that filled the tank where the railroad
-engines took their water. Tamba drank
-some, and then, finding a place where the grass
-was taller and thicker than any he had yet seen,
-he made himself a sort of nest and curled up in
-it.</p>
-
-<p>“I can sleep here, and Nero, that big lion, can’t
-splash any water into my nose and make me
-sneeze,” thought Tamba, as he snuggled up.</p>
-
-<p>At first he could not get to sleep. He had
-been too much frightened by the train wreck,
-though he was so far away now that he could not
-hear the din, which still kept up. But at last
-Tamba closed his eyes, and soon he was slumbering<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_47"></a>[47]</span>
-as peacefully as your cat sleeps before the
-fire.</p>
-
-<p>It was daylight when Tamba awakened, and,
-for a moment, he did not remember where he
-was. He stretched out first one big paw after
-another and then he called:</p>
-
-<p>“Well, Tum Tum, what sort of day is it going
-to be?”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba used to do this in the circus tent, for
-the jolly elephant was so big that he could look
-over the tops of the cages and tell whether or not
-the sun was going to shine. Most animals
-awaken before the sun comes up—just as it begins
-to get daylight, in fact.</p>
-
-<p>But Tum Tum did not answer Tamba this
-time. The jolly elephant was badly hurt in the
-railroad accident, but of course the tiger did not
-know this just yet. Tamba did know, however,
-that he had made a mistake.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, I forgot!” he said to himself. “Tum
-Tum isn’t here! I’m not in the circus any more.
-I’m free, and I can go to my jungle. I must
-start at once!”</p>
-
-<p>Then Tamba arose, and stretched himself
-some more. He liked to feel the damp earth
-under his paws, and he liked the feeling of the
-dry grasses as they rubbed against his sides.</p>
-
-<p>“Why, I feel hungry!” suddenly said the tiger.
-“I wonder where I can get anything to eat in this,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_48"></a>[48]</span>
-the beginning of the jungle.” You see, Tamba
-still thought the jungle was close at hand, but, to
-tell you the truth, it was far away, over the sea,
-and Tamba could not get to it except in a ship.</p>
-
-<p>The more Tamba thought about it the hungrier
-he became. He knew no men would come
-to him now with chunks of meat, as they had
-used to come in the circus.</p>
-
-<p>“I must hunt meat for myself, the same as I
-did when I lived in the jungle with my father
-and mother,” thought the tiger. “Well, I did
-it once, and I can do it again. I wonder what
-kind of meat I can find?”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba did not have to wonder very long, for
-he soon saw some big muskrats, and he made a
-meal off them.</p>
-
-<p>Then Tamba looked about him, and began to
-think of what he would do to get to the deeper
-part of the jungle—the part where the trees
-grew. He wanted to be in the thick, dark
-woods. All wild animals love the quiet darkness
-when they are not after something to eat.</p>
-
-<p>But it was now broad daylight, and Tamba
-knew he must be careful how he went about.
-Men could easily see him during the day. He
-remembered he had been told this in the jungle,
-years before, by his father. But in the jungle
-Tamba was not so easy to see as he was on this
-railroad meadow. The yellow and black stripes<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_49"></a>[49]</span>
-of a tiger’s skin are so like the patches of light
-and shadow that fall through the tangle of vines
-in a jungle, that often the hunters may be very
-close to one of the wild beasts and yet not see it.
-The tiger looks very much like the leaves and
-sunshine, mingled.</p>
-
-<p>“But I guess if I slink along and keep well
-down in the tall grass no one will see me,”
-thought Tamba. “That’s what I’ll do! I’ll
-keep hiding as long as I can until I get to my
-jungle. Then I’ll be all right. I’ll be very
-glad to see my father and mother again, and my
-sister and brother. The circus animals were all
-very nice, but still I like my own folks best.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba slunk along, going very softly
-through the tall grass. If you had been near the
-place you would probably have thought that it
-was only the wind blowing the reeds, so little
-noise did Tamba make. Tigers and such cat-like
-animals know how to go very softly.</p>
-
-<p>All at once, as Tamba was slinking along, he
-heard the sound of men’s voices talking. He
-knew them at once, though of course he could
-not tell what they were saying. Besides the
-voices of the men, he heard queer clinking-clanking
-sounds and the rattle of chains.
-Tamba knew what the rattle of chains meant—it
-meant that elephants were near at hand, for
-the circus elephants wear clanking chains on<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_50"></a>[50]</span>
-their legs, being made fast by them to stakes
-driven into the ground.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! I had better look out,” thought Tamba.
-“Maybe those are the circus men after me.”</p>
-
-<p>The tame tiger was partly right and partly
-wrong. The voices he heard were those of the
-circus men, and the chains clanking were those
-on the legs of elephants. The men were trying
-to clear away what was left of the circus wreck.
-Tamba had taken the wrong path, and had
-walked right back to where he had started from.</p>
-
-<p>“This won’t do!” he said to himself. “I must
-get farther away and hide!”</p>
-
-<p>He peered between the tall grasses and dimly
-saw where the circus men were working along
-the railroad tracks, lifting up some of the overturned
-cars and cages. The elephants were
-helping, for they were very strong.</p>
-
-<p>“I’ll notice which way the sun is shining, and
-then I’ll know which way to go to keep away
-from the circus men,” thought Tamba. Then
-he turned straight about and ran off the other
-way.</p>
-
-<p>On and on, over the big stretch of meadows
-and lonely land near the railroad went the tiger
-until he had placed many miles between himself
-and the scene of the wreck. In all this time
-Tamba did not see any men, or any living creatures
-except some muskrats, many of which lived
-in the swamp along the railroad. The muskrats<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_51"></a>[51]</span>
-were not glad to see Tamba, for the tiger caught
-a number of them for food, but it could not be
-helped.</p>
-
-<p>No one saw Tamba sneaking along through
-the grass. If any one had seen him they would
-have hurried to tell the circus men, for a general
-alarm had been sent out, telling that some of the
-wild animals, including a big, striped tiger, had
-got loose after the wreck.</p>
-
-<p>But no one saw Tamba, and he saw no one, at
-least for a while. On and on he went until night
-came again. Then he found another snug place
-in among the dried grass where he curled up to
-sleep.</p>
-
-<p>“My jungle is farther away than I thought it
-was,” said Tamba to himself, as he awoke on the
-second morning of his freedom. “I must run
-along faster to get there more quickly.”</p>
-
-<p>After he had eaten and taken some water, he
-started off once again, and then began a series
-of very strange adventures for the tame tiger.</p>
-
-<p>Toward the close of the afternoon of the second
-day of his freedom Tamba stepped out of
-a little patch of woods, into which he had gone
-from the meadow, and there, in the light of the
-setting sun, the tiger saw a red, wooden building
-which he seemed to know.</p>
-
-<p>“Why, there’s a barn!” said Tamba to himself.
-“There’s a barn. I’ll go in there and stay for<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_52"></a>[52]</span>
-the night. I wonder if there are any other animals
-in it.”</p>
-
-<p>The reason Tamba knew this was a barn was
-because, when he had first joined the circus, he
-had been taken to a barn, and there was taught
-some tricks. The circus folk and the animals
-lived in a big barn instead of tents during the
-winter. So when Tamba saw this building he
-knew, at once, that it was a barn.</p>
-
-<p>Now it happened that this was a barn belonging
-to a farmer, who also owned a house near by,
-but which Tamba could not see on account of the
-trees. So, making sure that no one was about,
-Tamba walked toward the barn, and, one of the
-doors being open, in walked the tiger.</p>
-
-<p>He looked all around, as best he could, for it
-was not very light, and he sniffed and smelled the
-smell of animals.</p>
-
-<p>“Maybe some of my friends are here,” thought
-Tamba. “I’ll slink around and see.”</p>
-
-<p>So he walked softly and slinkingly to the middle
-of the barn floor, and peered about, and, right
-after that, a very strange thing happened.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_53"></a>[53]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI<br />
-<small>TAMBA MEETS TINKLE</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">At first when he went into the barn through
-the door which was open, Tamba, the
-tame tiger, could not see very much. It
-was the same as when you go into a dark moving-picture
-theater from the bright sunshine outside.</p>
-
-<p>But, in a little while, Tamba’s eyes could see
-better, and he noticed some piles of hay and straw
-in the barn. That made him feel more at home.</p>
-
-<p>“This is just like the circus barn where I used
-to be before we started out with the tents,”
-thought Tamba to himself. “That is hay, which
-Tum Tum and the other elephants used to eat.
-I don’t like it myself. I like meat and milk.
-But I don’t see any elephants here.”</p>
-
-<p>And for a very good reason, as you know.
-Farmers don’t keep elephants and other circus
-animals in their barns.</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba looked about in the barn, and he
-sniffed and smelled with his black nose, hoping
-to smell something good to eat. But though
-there was an animal smell about the place (because
-there were cows and horses in the lower<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_54"></a>[54]</span>
-part of the barn) still Tamba did not want to eat
-any of them.</p>
-
-<p>If he had been in the jungle he might have felt
-like eating a cow, or, what is very much the same
-thing, a water buffalo. But since he had been in
-the circus he had been used to eating the same
-kind of meat that you see in butcher shops. So,
-though the tiger was quite hungry, and though
-there were cows and hay in the farmer’s barn,
-Tamba did not see much chance of getting a
-meal.</p>
-
-<p>“I’ll starve before I’ll eat hay,” he said. “It’s
-all right for elephants and horses and ponies, like
-the Shetland ponies we had in the circus, but hay
-is not good for tigers.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba walked farther into the barn, looking
-about and sniffing about, and then, all at once,
-he heard some one whistle. Tamba knew what
-a whistle was, for often his own trainer or the
-trainer of Nero would go about the circus tent
-whistling. So, when Tamba, in the barn, heard
-some one coming along whistling a merry tune
-he at once thought to himself:</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, perhaps that is one of the circus men
-coming to take me back to my cage in the tent!
-Well, I’m not going! I’m going to go back to
-my jungle, and not to the circus! I’ll just hide
-where they can’t find me!”</p>
-
-<p>Now the big pile of hay in the barn seemed the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_55"></a>[55]</span>
-best place in the world for Tamba to hide in,
-and, as the whistling sounds came nearer and
-nearer, the tiger crept softly across the barn floor,
-and soon was snuggling down in the hay.</p>
-
-<p>“I remember once, when I lived in the jungle,
-I hid in a pile of dry grass just like this hay,”
-thought Tamba. “It was when I wanted to play
-a trick on my brother Bitie. I jumped out at
-him and scared him so he ran off with his tail between
-his legs. Maybe I can jump out and scare
-this circus man so he won’t want to take me
-back.”</p>
-
-<p>You see Tamba thought surely it was a circus
-man coming into the barn whistling. But it
-wasn’t at all. It was the boy who worked on the
-farm. His father had sent him to the barn to
-gather the eggs which the chickens had laid, and
-this boy, whose name was Tom, nearly always
-went about his chores whistling.</p>
-
-<p>“I hope I get a lot of eggs to-day,” said Tom,
-speaking aloud to himself, as he stopped whistling.
-“Maybe I can get a whole basket full.
-I’ll look in the hay for them. Hens like to lay
-their eggs in the hay. It’s a good place for them
-to hide.”</p>
-
-<p>Now, if that farmer boy had only known it,
-there was something else hidden in the hay besides
-hens’ eggs. There was Tamba, the tame
-tiger. Tamba had worked himself down into a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_56"></a>[56]</span>
-regular nest in the dried grass, and only his eyes
-peered out. They were very bright and shining
-eyes, and they watched every move of the farmer
-boy.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba saw the basket which the boy carried
-in his hand so he might put the eggs in it, and,
-seeing this basket, the tame tiger thought to himself:</p>
-
-<p>“Well, if he expects to take me back to the circus
-in that little basket he’s very much mistaken.
-Why, it wouldn’t hold two of my paws!”</p>
-
-<p>And then Tamba took a second look, and he
-saw that the boy was not one of the circus keepers,
-as the tiger had at first supposed.</p>
-
-<p>“But he whistles just like one,” thought
-Tamba. “I wonder what he wants.”</p>
-
-<p>So the boy, not knowing anything about the
-tiger in the hay, walked right toward Tamba,
-hoping to gather eggs.</p>
-
-<p>In another moment, just as the boy began poking
-his hand down in the loose hay, hoping to
-find a hen’s nest full of eggs there, Tamba made
-up his mind it was time for him to do something.</p>
-
-<p>“I’ll give this fellow, whoever he is, a good
-scare!” said Tamba to himself. “I’ll teach him
-to come looking for me with a basket! Look
-out now, you whistling chap!” said Tamba to
-himself.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_57"></a>[57]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_p057">
- <img src="images/i_p057.jpg" alt="" title="" />
- <br />
- <div class="caption"><a href="#Page_58">He dropped his basket.</a></div>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_58"></a>[58-<br />59]</span></p>
-
-<p>Then he gave a loud growl—one of his very
-loudest—and he raised himself from his nest in
-the hay, and stuck his head out.</p>
-
-<p>Now if you had gone hunting hens’ eggs in
-your father’s barn, and had, all of a sudden, seen
-a great, big, striped tiger jump out at you from
-the hay, giving a loud growl, I believe you
-would have done just what this boy did. And
-what he did was this.</p>
-
-<p><a href="#i_p057">He dropped his basket</a>, gave one look at
-Tamba in the hay, and then uttered such a yell
-that his father and mother in the farmhouse,
-quite a distance off, heard him. And then that
-boy ran out of the barn as fast as he could run.
-That’s what this boy did, and I think you would
-have done the same.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I guess he won’t come back right
-away,” thought Tamba. “But there may be others
-like him. If I stay here I may have to scare
-a whole lot of them. I guess I’ll find a new hiding
-place.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba came out from his nest in the hay
-and began moving about in the barn, looking for
-a new place in which to snuggle, and perhaps
-find something to eat. And the first thing he
-knew he stepped right into a hen’s nest of eggs.
-Right down among the eggs Tamba put his
-paw.</p>
-
-<p>Of course he broke some of the eggs, but he
-took up his paw so quickly again that not many<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_60"></a>[60]</span>
-of the shells were cracked. And, as his paw was
-covered with the sticky whites and yellows of the
-eggs, Tamba began licking it with his tongue to
-make it clean.</p>
-
-<p>“Hum! These eggs taste as good as the ones
-I used to get in the jungle,” said the tiger to himself.
-“Guess I’ll eat them. I’m hungry, and
-they’ll be almost as good as meat.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba carefully cracked the egg shells and
-sucked out the whites and yellows. He ate a
-whole dozen of eggs before he finished, and then
-he felt better.</p>
-
-<p>“Now I’ll go and find a new place to hide,”
-he said to himself.</p>
-
-<p>He found a stairway leading from the upper
-part of the barn, where the hay was stored, to the
-lower part, where were the stables of the cows
-and horses. Down the stairs softly went Tamba,
-and no sooner was he down there than he felt
-right at home. For it smelled just like that part
-of the circus where the horses were kept. And,
-as a matter of fact, there were a number of horses
-in the barn, and quite a few cows.</p>
-
-<p>At first the horses were afraid of the tiger, and
-pulled at the straps which held them fast in their
-stalls. But Tamba, speaking in animal talk,
-said:</p>
-
-<p>“I am a tame tiger. I won’t hurt any of you.
-I only want to hide here so the circus men won’t<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_61"></a>[61]</span>
-find me. I am on my way back to the jungle.
-I have run away from the circus.”</p>
-
-<p>When Tamba spoke thus kindly the horses
-were no longer afraid. One of them said
-Tamba might hide in a pile of straw near his
-stall, and this the tiger was glad to do. He
-stretched out, and got ready to go to sleep.</p>
-
-<p>Now I must tell you a little about the farmer
-boy. When he saw the tiger rear up at him out
-of the hay, and ran away, screaming with fear,
-he did not know what to do. All he could yell
-was:</p>
-
-<p>“The tiger! The tiger! A big striped tiger
-is in our barn!”</p>
-
-<p>The boy’s father and mother heard him shouting
-and yelling, and they ran out of the house to
-see what the matter was. They saw that Tom
-was very much frightened indeed.</p>
-
-<p>“What is it?” they asked.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh,” Tom answered, “I went to get some
-eggs out of the hay, and I found a tiger there!
-He had great big eyes, big teeth and a big
-mouth!”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, Tom! Really?” asked his mother.</p>
-
-<p>“Really and truly!” he answered. “You can
-go and look for yourself!”</p>
-
-<p>“No, I don’t believe I want to,” said Tom’s
-mother. “But do you really think he did see a
-tiger?” she asked her husband.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_62"></a>[62]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Well, I don’t know,” he slowly answered.
-“I read in the paper something about a circus
-train having been wrecked, and maybe a tiger
-or an elephant got loose and is roaming about.”</p>
-
-<p>“It’s a tiger—not an elephant—and he’s in our
-barn,” said Tom. “Come and see, Dad! But
-you’d better bring your gun!”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” agreed the farmer, “I think I had.
-And I’ll call some of the men to help hunt the
-tiger, too!”</p>
-
-<p>But, as it happened, by the time the farmer
-had called some neighbors in to help him and
-they had gotten their guns, Tamba had left the
-upper part of the barn, where the hay was, and
-had gone downstairs among the horses and cows.
-And as the farmer and his friends did not know
-this, and as none of the horses or cows called out
-to tell the men, they didn’t know where Tamba
-was.</p>
-
-<p>They looked in the hay, where the boy had
-seen him, but Tamba was gone. The men even
-found the place where Tamba had eaten the
-eggs, but the jungle circus beast was not in
-sight. He was well hidden downstairs in the
-straw near the stall of the kind horse.</p>
-
-<p>So the men hunted in vain, and some of them
-thought the tiger had gone back to the circus,
-while others thought he had run off to the woods,
-perhaps. At any rate, they did not find him in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_63"></a>[63]</span>
-the barn, though he was there all the while they
-were searching. A wild animal sometimes
-knows better how to hide than you boys and girls
-do when you are playing games.</p>
-
-<p>And now I must tell you something that happened
-to Tamba, as he still hid in the lower part
-of the barn. He was snugly curled up in the
-straw when suddenly there was a patter of little
-hoofs on the floor, and a small pony trotted into
-his small stall, which was near that of the big
-horse, next to which Tamba was hiding.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, friends, here I am back!” cried the little
-pony. “I have been giving the boys and girls
-a ride, and now I’ve come back to have something
-to eat. Has anything happened while I
-was out, hitched to the basket cart, giving rides
-to the boys and girls? Has anything happened?”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” answered the old horse, near whose
-stall Tamba was hiding in the straw, “something
-strange has happened. A big striped animal,
-who calls himself a tiger, came into our barn.”</p>
-
-<p>“A tiger!” cried the little pony. “Why, I’d
-like to see him. I know something about
-tigers.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, do you?” asked Tamba himself, sticking
-his head out of the straw, as he had stuck it out
-of the hay at Tom. But the pony was not frightened.
-“So you know something about tigers, do<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_64"></a>[64]</span>
-you?” went on Tamba. “Well, what is your
-name, if I may ask? Mine is Tamba.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, ho! I know that very well!” neighed
-the pony. “You don’t know me, Tamba, but I
-have often seen you in the circus. I am Tinkle,
-the trick pony. I was in the circus a short time
-myself, but there were so many of us little Shetland
-ponies that I don’t suppose you remember
-me. But there were only a few tigers in the
-show, and I remember you very well. Didn’t
-you used to jump through a paper hoop as one of
-your tricks?”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” answered Tamba, “I did. And, now
-that you speak of it, I believe I remember you.
-You used to pull, around the ring, a little cart
-with a funny clown in it, didn’t you?”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” said Tinkle, “I did. Well, Tamba,
-I’m glad to see you again. But what brings you
-so far from the circus, and why are you hiding
-here?”</p>
-
-<p>“That,” said Tamba, “is a long story. I’ll tell
-it to you!”</p>
-
-<p>But, all of a sudden, one of the cows at the far
-end of the stable mooed out:</p>
-
-<p>“Quick, Tamba! Here comes the man to
-milk us! Hide in the straw so he won’t see
-you!”</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_65"></a>[65]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII<br />
-<small>TAMBA AND SQUINTY</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Tamba did not need to be told twice
-what to do. As soon as he heard the
-kind words of the cow the tame tiger
-ran softly on his padded feet and snuggled down
-again in the straw. And the man came in,
-milked the cows, and went out with the foaming
-pails without knowing anything about the circus
-tiger hiding in the lower part of the barn. He
-thought the tiger had gone away.</p>
-
-<p>“Now it’s all right—he’s gone and you may
-come out,” said the cow to Tamba, and the tiger,
-shaking the straw from his striped black and yellow
-fur, walked out to talk some more to Tinkle,
-the trick pony.</p>
-
-<p>“You were going to tell us how it was you left
-the circus, Tamba,” said Tinkle. “Make a
-good, long story of it. I like stories.”</p>
-
-<p>“I haven’t time to make it too long,” said
-Tamba, “for I must be on my way. I want to
-get back to my jungle. At first I thought the
-long grass near the railroad was the place I
-wanted. But I see it is not the jungle where I
-used to live. So I must travel on a long way,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_66"></a>[66]</span>
-and the sooner I start the quicker I’ll be there.
-But I’ll tell you how I got loose from the circus.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba told Tinkle the story I have told
-you—how the circus was wrecked in the railroad
-accident, and how the cage burst open, letting
-the tame tiger loose.</p>
-
-<p>“And now I’m here,” finished Tamba. “But
-tell me, Tinkle, how did you come to leave the
-circus?”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I had many adventures,” said the trick
-pony. “I used to live on a stockfarm, something
-like this, only there were more horses on it. I
-was taken away to live with a nice boy, who
-taught me many tricks, and then a bad man, with
-a big moving wagon, came along one day and
-stole me away. He sold me to the circus, and it
-was there I saw you, Tamba. I know Tum
-Tum, too, and Dido, the dancing bear!”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, they are all friends of mine,” said
-Tamba. “At least they were before I left.
-Now, I suppose, I’ll never see them again, for I
-am going to the jungle. But you haven’t yet
-told me, Tinkle, how you came to leave the circus.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, it’s all written down in a book,” answered
-the trick pony.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, a book!” exclaimed Tamba. “I’ve
-heard Tum Tum and Dido speak of being in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_67"></a>[67]</span>
-books, but I didn’t know what they meant. And
-I haven’t time to learn now, so suppose you tell
-me.”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, there’s a book all about me and my
-adventures,” said Tinkle, the trick pony. “But,
-as long as you can’t read it, I’ll just tell you that,
-one day, when I was in the circus doing my
-tricks, George, the boy who used to own me before
-I was stolen away, came to the show.
-There he and his sister saw me and they knew me
-again, and I was taken out of the circus and
-given back to my little master. I’ve lived with
-him ever since. We often come to this farm in
-the summer, and I have just been giving him and
-his sister and some of the other children a ride
-in the pony cart. George is very nice to me, and
-gives me lumps of sugar.”</p>
-
-<p>“I hope he isn’t the boy whom I scared in the
-hay,” said Tamba. “I would not want to scare
-any friend of yours, Tinkle.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, well, if you only scared him, and didn’t
-scratch him, I guess it will be all right,” said
-the trick pony. “But I don’t believe it was
-George you frightened, as he was out driving me.
-It must have been Tom, or one of the other boys.”
-And so it was, as Tinkle learned later.</p>
-
-<p>“And so you are going to the jungle, are you?”
-asked Tinkle of Tamba, when they had talked a
-while longer.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_68"></a>[68]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Yes, I want to get back to my old home,” answered
-the tiger. “I don’t like it in the circus.
-But, still, there was one thing I liked in it, and
-that was the good meals I had. I’m very hungry
-right now.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, excuse me!” exclaimed Tinkle. “I
-should have thought of that before. I’m so
-sorry! Won’t you have some of my hay or
-oats?”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, and give him some of our bran,” added
-the cow who had told about the man coming in
-to milk.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, thank you, very much, Tinkle. And
-you too, my cow friend,” replied the tiger gratefully.
-“But I can’t eat hay, bran, or oats. We
-tigers must have meat. I don’t suppose you eat
-any of that?”</p>
-
-<p>“No,” said Tinkle, “we don’t. It’s too bad!
-I don’t know how we can give you anything to
-eat. It’s no fun to be hungry, either.”</p>
-
-<p>“I know how we can feed your tiger friend,”
-said one of the big farm horses.</p>
-
-<p>“How?” eagerly asked Tinkle. He felt just
-as you would feel if some friend came to visit
-you and you couldn’t give him anything to eat.
-“How can I feed Tamba on the meat that he
-likes?” asked Tinkle.</p>
-
-<p>“I’ll tell you,” went on the horse. “You know<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_69"></a>[69]</span>
-the big dog who drives the sheep to and from
-the meadow?”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, yes, I know our sheep-dog very well,”
-said Tinkle. “He is a friend of mine.”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, he has company,” went on the horse.
-“A dog named Don has come to see him and
-spend the day. I came in just now from plowing
-one of the fields, and I saw the farmer’s
-wife put a big plate of meat and bones out near
-the dog kennel. She said it would do for our
-dog and his friend, Don.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, but if the meat is for the dogs they’ll eat
-it all up, and there won’t be any for Tamba,”
-said Tinkle.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, but wait a minute!” neighed the horse.
-“I didn’t finish. Don and our dog went off to
-the woods. I heard them say they would be
-gone for a long time, and maybe they would find
-something to eat there. So if they don’t come
-back to eat the bones and meat Tamba can have
-it.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” said Tinkle, “I suppose he can. I
-hope Don doesn’t come back.”</p>
-
-<p>“I hope so, too,” said Tamba. “I’m getting
-hungrier every minute.”</p>
-
-<p>“I’ll go out and look,” said Tinkle. “It will
-soon be dark, and if the plate of meat is still by
-the dog kennel, you can sneak out and get it,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_70"></a>[70]</span>
-Tamba, and no one will see you. I’ll go and
-look.”</p>
-
-<p>Tinkle, the trick pony, was not kept tied in a
-stall as were the other horses. He could roam
-about as he liked, and so he trotted out of the
-barn to where the farm dog had his house, or
-kennel. There, surely enough, was a big plate
-of meat and some large bones, large enough,
-even, for a lion or a tiger.</p>
-
-<p>“It’s all right,” said Tinkle, when he came
-trotting back. “The meat is there, Tamba, and
-I didn’t see anything of Carlo, our dog, nor his
-friend, Don. Now if they don’t come back until
-dark, why, you can go out and have a good
-meal.”</p>
-
-<p>“I will, thank you,” returned Tamba, and he
-wished, with all his heart, that Don and the other
-dog would not come back.</p>
-
-<p>“Of course I don’t want to see them hungry,”
-thought Tamba, “but they may get something to
-eat in the woods, and perhaps I couldn’t do that.
-There may be no muskrats there.”</p>
-
-<p>Everything came out all right. The twilight
-faded, and it became dark. Then Tamba, who
-remained hidden in the stable, crept softly out
-to the plate of meat and bones that had been left
-for the dogs. He ate up everything and gnawed
-the bones, and then he got a drink of water from
-the horse trough and felt much better.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_71"></a>[71]</span></p>
-
-<p>“And now, Tinkle, I will bid you and your
-kind friends good-by and be on my way to get
-back to the jungle,” said Tamba, after he had
-eaten.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, are you going to run away?” asked the
-trick pony. “You’ll be just like Don, the dog,
-then. He ran away, too.”</p>
-
-<p>“But he ran back again, as I have heard my
-friend, Nero, the circus lion, say,” replied
-Tamba. “I am not exactly running away from
-you. I ran away from the circus, but I am only
-leaving you after paying you a visit. And I
-liked my visit very much. That meat, too, was
-very good. Thank you, Tinkle.”</p>
-
-<p>“I only wish there had been more of it,” said
-the trick pony. “But, if you have to go, I suppose
-you must leave. I hope you’ll get safely to
-your jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>But Tamba had many adventures ahead of
-him before that time. He said good-by to Tinkle
-and the farm animals, and then, looking out
-of the barn and peering through the darkness, to
-see that none of the farmer’s men were on the
-watch with their guns, Tamba slunk out into the
-night.</p>
-
-<p>Once more he was on his way, traveling to find
-his jungle. On through the dark woods and
-over the fields went Tamba, taking care to keep
-away from houses where people might live who<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_72"></a>[72]</span>
-would see him and tell the circus men to come
-and get him. Tamba did not want to be caught.</p>
-
-<p>So, for several days, Tamba traveled on.
-Often he was hungry and thirsty, but he managed
-to find things to eat once in a while, and
-now and again he came to springs of water or
-streams where he drank. So, though he did not
-have a very good time, he managed to live.</p>
-
-<p>One evening, just as it was getting dark,
-Tamba sniffed the air and smelled a smell which
-told him he was near another stable and barn.
-It was not the one where Tinkle lived, though.</p>
-
-<p>“I wonder if I can get anything to eat here,”
-thought Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>Carefully and softly the tame tiger crept
-around the corner of the carriage house. Near
-by he saw what seemed to be a low building without
-any roof a little way ahead of him, and from
-this place came gruntings and squealings.</p>
-
-<p>“Get over on your own side of the trough!
-You’re eating all my sour milk!” said one squealy
-voice.</p>
-
-<p>“I am not, either, Squinty!” came the answer.
-“I want something to eat just as much as you do!”</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! Something to eat!” thought Tamba
-who heard and understood this animal talk. “I
-wonder who those chaps are, and who Squinty
-is. And I wonder if they have enough for me
-to eat. I’m going to see!”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_73"></a>[73]</span></p>
-
-<p>Up to the pen, which had no roof, went
-Tamba, and, rising on his two hind legs, he
-looked over the side and down in. There he saw
-a number of pigs who were drinking sour milk
-and bran from a trough.</p>
-
-<p>One of the pigs, with a queer droop to one eye,
-looked up and saw Tamba peering in.</p>
-
-<p>“Hello!” grunted this pig. “Who are you,
-and what’s the matter?”</p>
-
-<p>“I’m Tamba, a tame tiger,” was the answer,
-“and the matter is that I’m hungry. Who are
-you?”</p>
-
-<p>“Squinty, the comical pig!” was the grunting
-reply. “And you had better travel on! We
-have nothing here for tigers to eat!”</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_74"></a>[74]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII<br />
-<small>TAMBA IN THE CITY</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Tamba, the tame tiger, rearing up on
-his hind legs to look down into the pig
-pen, saw the funny look on the face of
-the animal who had spoken to him.</p>
-
-<p>“What’s that you say?” asked Tamba in a
-growling voice.</p>
-
-<p>“I said we didn’t have anything to give tigers,”
-went on the comical pig, and really he was comical,
-for his one eye had such a funny look as it
-drooped toward one ear. It seemed to be looking
-in two ways at once, and that is something
-you don’t often see in a pig.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, it seems to me I smell something very
-good,” went on Tamba. “It smells like milk to
-me.” When he was a little tiger Tamba had
-liked milk very much, and now, even though he
-was older, he knew it would be good when he
-was hungry.</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, you do smell milk,” went on Squinty.
-“But it is sour.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_75"></a>[75]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Sour or sweet, it makes no difference to me,”
-replied Tamba. “I am hungry enough to eat
-anything.”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I don’t want to be cross or impolite,”
-said Squinty, “but there is only enough sour milk
-for us pigs. We can’t give you any.”</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! Well, I simply must have something
-to eat!” returned Tamba, and his voice was more
-growly now. “If I can’t get milk I must have
-meat. I remember once, in the jungle, eating
-a little pig who looked something like you.
-What’s to stop me taking a few bites off you, if
-you won’t give me any of your milk?”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, ho! So you think you can bite me, do
-you?” squealed Squinty. “Well, we’ll see about
-that!”</p>
-
-<p>Now Squinty was a brave little animal, and he
-had seen more of the world than some of the
-other small pigs in the pen. In fact, Squinty
-had had a number of adventures, and those of
-you who have read my first book entitled,
-“Squinty, the Comical Pig,” know that Squinty
-was not much afraid of anything.</p>
-
-<p>So no sooner did he hear Tamba talk that way,
-about taking bites, and so on, than Squinty ran
-to where there was a loose board in the pen, and
-out he popped.</p>
-
-<p>“Ho! So you think because you’re a big, circus
-tiger that you can scare me, do you?”<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_76"></a>[76]</span>
-squealed Squinty. “Well, I’ll show you that
-I’m not a bit afraid!”</p>
-
-<p>Now, as it happened, near the pen, where the
-farmer intended to use it the next day, was a
-pail of whitewash. It was like thick, white
-water, and the pail was full of it. Squinty gave
-one look at the pail of whitewash, and a glance
-at Tamba, who had taken his forepaws down off
-the edge of the pen, and was standing on all four
-feet looking at Squinty.</p>
-
-<p>“There! Take that and see how you like it!”
-squealed Squinty, and with his strong nose, made
-for digging down under the ground after roots
-and things, Squinty upset the pail of whitewash
-and gave it a push toward Tamba.</p>
-
-<p><a href="#i_p077">The whitewash splashed out, and</a> lots of it
-<a href="#i_p077">splattered on the tame tiger</a>, so that he was
-splashed and speckled with spots of white as
-well as being marked with black and yellow
-stripes.</p>
-
-<p>“Now how do you like yourself?” asked
-Squinty of Tamba, as he looked at the tame tiger
-in the moonlight, for the moon was just coming
-up. “If you try to bite me or any of my friends
-I’ll splash some more whitewash on you!”</p>
-
-<p>“You can’t,” said Tamba. “There isn’t any
-more left in the pail. It’s empty; I can see for
-myself. I guess I got most of it on me.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_77"></a>[77]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_p077">
- <img src="images/i_p077.jpg" alt="" title="" />
- <br />
- <div class="caption"><a href="#Page_76">The whitewash splashed out and splattered on the tame
-tiger</a></div>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_78"></a>[78-<br />79]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Well, if I can’t throw whitewash on you I’ll
-throw something else!” threatened Squinty.
-“You’ve got to leave us pigs alone!”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” said Tamba, “I can see that I’d better.
-I didn’t know you were such a fierce chap,
-Squinty.”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I didn’t mean to be cross,” said the pig.
-“But when you talked of biting me, why, I just
-couldn’t help it. I’m sorry I spotted you with
-white like that.”</p>
-
-<p>“It’s all my fault,” returned Tamba. “I
-shouldn’t have said anything about biting you.
-Being splashed with whitewash serves me right.
-But I am very hungry, and your sour milk
-smelled very good!”</p>
-
-<p>“I’m afraid there isn’t much left now,” said
-Squinty. “The pigs were very hungry to-night.
-But if you’ll come over to the side of the pen,
-where I broke out to rush at you, I’ll see if there
-is anything else. Sometimes they throw kitchen
-table scraps into our trough, and there are bits of
-meat which we small pigs don’t eat. You may
-have that, if there is any. Tigers like meat, I’ve
-heard.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” said Tamba, “I like meat very much.
-It is about all I can eat, though I could manage
-to drink some milk—sour or sweet.”</p>
-
-<p>“Come, we’ll go see what there is,” went on
-Squinty. “When I said we had nothing for tigers
-I didn’t think about the meat scraps.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_80"></a>[80]</span></p>
-
-<p>So Squinty led Tamba back to the side of the
-pen whence the little pig had pushed his way out.
-Then Squinty explained to the other pigs what
-had happened.</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, here are some meat scraps,” said one of
-the pigs, when Squinty had told how hungry
-Tamba was. “It isn’t very much, though.”</p>
-
-<p>“Even a little will keep me from starving,”
-said Tamba. “When I get to my jungle I’ll
-have all I want to eat, but just now it is pretty
-hard to find enough. In the circus I had plenty.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, so you’re from the circus, are you?”
-asked Squinty. “I used to know some animals
-in a circus. There was Mappo, the merry monkey.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, I have heard of him, too,” said Tamba.
-“But he isn’t with the show now. Ah, but this
-meat tastes good!”</p>
-
-<p>The tame tiger was now chewing the scraps
-the pigs had brushed aside as they did not want
-them. Tamba did not feel so hungry now, but
-he did feel queer where the whitewash had
-splashed on him.</p>
-
-<p>“I’m sorry about that,” said Squinty. “If you
-go down to the end of the meadow there is a
-pond, and you can wash off the white splashes.
-It’s warm enough to take a bath.”</p>
-
-<p>“I’m not very fond of water,” said Tamba,
-“though I do take a bath now and then. I guess<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_81"></a>[81]</span>
-I can wash off the white stuff by dipping my
-paws in the water and rubbing them over my
-striped coat. I’ll do it.”</p>
-
-<p>And that is what Tamba did after he had eaten
-up all the meat scraps there were in the pigs’
-pen. Then he said good-by to Squinty and the
-others and started off again.</p>
-
-<p>“I must get to my jungle,” said the tiger. “I
-have been away from the circus quite a while
-now, and, as yet, I have not come to the jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>“But you have had lots of adventures,” said
-Squinty, the comical pig, for Tamba had told of
-some of the things that had happened to him.
-“You have had almost as many adventures as I,
-Tamba. I suppose you can call that an adventure,
-when I splashed the whitewash on you.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” agreed Tamba, “I think that, most certainly,
-was an adventure. I don’t want another
-like it, though.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba traveled on again. He thought, if
-he went far enough, he must, some day or other,
-come to the jungle where he used to live. But
-he did not know which way to go, and, often as
-not, he went wrong. However, as Squinty said,
-the tame tiger was having many adventures.</p>
-
-<p>He had a queer one the second night after he
-had met Squinty, and this is the way it happened.
-Tamba had been roaming along in the
-night, after having caught something to eat in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_82"></a>[82]</span>
-the woods, and at last he came out on a road
-which stretched far and away in the moonlight.</p>
-
-<p>“That is a long road to travel,” thought
-Tamba. “I think I will take a rest before I go
-down it any farther. I’ll hide somewhere and
-wait until morning.”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba looked around for a place to hide, and
-saw a big pile of hay. He knew it was hay, since
-he had often seen it in the circus tent, and he
-remembered having hidden in the hay in the
-barn.</p>
-
-<p>“But this hay isn’t in a barn,” said Tamba, as
-he looked at the pile. “It seems to be on a
-wagon, as my cage used to be.”</p>
-
-<p>And that is just what it was. Tamba had
-come to a farm, and a little way down the road
-from the farmhouse was a wagon loaded with a
-great pile of hay. The farmer had loaded the
-hay on the wagon the evening before, so as to
-have it all ready to hitch his horses to and pull it
-into the city early in the morning. The farmer
-was going to sell the hay in the big city.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, that hay will make a nice place for me
-to sleep,” thought Tamba. He gave a big jump,
-and landed on top of the load of hay. There
-were, as yet, no horses hitched to the wagon.
-That would be done in the morning.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba pawed out a nice, cozy bed for himself
-on top of the load of hay, burrowed away down<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_83"></a>[83]</span>
-in, pulled some hay over him as a covering, and
-went to sleep.</p>
-
-<p>How long he slept the tame tiger did not
-know. But when he suddenly awoke, he saw the
-sun shining, and he heard a rumble and roar all
-about him.</p>
-
-<p>“What’s this? Where am I? What has happened?”
-thought Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>He saw the hay all about him. He felt the
-jolting and sway of the wagon. The roaring
-sound became louder. Tamba looked out between
-the wisps of hay. He saw a strange sight.</p>
-
-<p>“Why, I’m in a big city!” thought the tiger.
-“The load of hay has come to the city, and I
-came with it! Oh, dear, I am farther than ever
-from my jungle! What shall I do?”</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_84"></a>[84]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX<br />
-<small>TAMBA IN THE SUBWAY</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Tamba, the tame tiger, had really come
-to the city on a load of hay. I know it
-sounds very strange to say that, but it
-really happened. I have often seen dogs riding
-along on a load of hay that had started to ride in
-the country, at the farmhouse where they lived,
-and had come all the way to the city. So if a
-dog can ride on a load of hay I don’t see why a
-tiger can’t, especially when he is a tame tiger.</p>
-
-<p>Anyhow, that’s what Tamba did. He rode
-along on the load of hay until it reached the big,
-noisy city. But the funny part of it was that the
-man who drove the load of hay didn’t know he
-was giving a ride to a tiger. If he had known
-that I don’t believe he would have guided his
-horses along so easily, nor do I believe the horses
-themselves would have gone so quietly.</p>
-
-<p>But there Tamba was, snugly curled up in a
-little nest on top of the load of hay, where no one
-could see him. He could look out and down
-at the city streets through which he was passing,
-and he saw many strange sights. But he was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_85"></a>[85]</span>
-used to them, and he was not afraid of being in
-the city. For he remembered having seen a city
-like this many times before when he was in his
-cage and the circus parade had gone up and
-down the streets to show the animals, so that boys
-and girls would be all the more anxious to come
-to the performance.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, I wonder what will happen to me
-now,” thought Tamba, as the hay wagon rumbled
-along the city streets. “I can’t stay here
-much longer. Some one will be sure to see me,
-and perhaps the man who owns this hay is taking
-it to the very circus where I used to live. If that
-happens they’ll get me back in a cage again, and
-I don’t want that to happen. I must be very
-careful!”</p>
-
-<p>On and on went the load of hay, with Tamba
-hiding at the top, and, pretty soon, the man drove
-into a sort of big yard. There were trees, and
-grass, and some buildings. But what made
-Tamba sit up and sniff eagerly was the smell of
-wild animals. I dare say you have often noticed
-it yourself when you have gone to the circus.
-Even with your eyes shut you can tell as soon as
-you enter the wild animal tent.</p>
-
-<p>“Dear me, this is very strange!” thought the
-tame tiger. “Can the man, with his load of hay,
-have brought me back to the very circus from
-which I ran away? It smells so, but I don’t see<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_86"></a>[86]</span>
-any of the big tents, nor yet the barn where I
-used to live in winter. Besides, this is summer,
-not winter. I wonder what it all means!”</p>
-
-<p>The more Tamba thought about it and the
-stronger the wild animal smell came to him, the
-more the tame tiger was puzzled. The load of
-hay, in which he was hidden, rumbled along,
-down a little hill, and then Tamba heard the man
-call:</p>
-
-<p>“Whoa!”</p>
-
-<p>That meant for the horses to stop. Tamba
-had often heard the circus men call that to their
-horses when they wanted them to stop pulling
-the big cage wagons, and so the tiger understood.</p>
-
-<p>“Now I wonder what will happen to me,”
-thought Tamba. He raised his head up from
-his snug nest in the hay and saw what he knew
-to be a barn, though it was not like the one near
-which he had met Squinty, the comical pig, nor
-like the one where he had frightened the boy
-Tom.</p>
-
-<p>“But it’s a barn all right,” thought Tamba.
-“And there must be some of my tiger, elephant
-and lion friends near it, else there wouldn’t be
-that wild animal smell. I wonder if Tum Tum,
-Nero and Dido are here. Maybe they brought
-them here after the train wreck.”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba did not know what to think, but what
-he wanted to do was to keep out of sight of any<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_87"></a>[87]</span>
-men who might be around, until he could think
-of what to do.</p>
-
-<p>“For I’m not in my jungle, that’s sure,” said
-Tamba to himself. “And how to get there I
-don’t know. But I’m not going back to the circus
-if I can help it.”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba now felt some one pulling at the load
-of hay, as if about to unload it from the wagon.
-Then the tame tiger, giving a look over the side
-and seeing no one, slipped and slid down, and,
-noticing an open door in the barn, through it he
-ran and hid in a dark corner.</p>
-
-<p>“There! Now maybe they can’t find me!”
-thought the tiger. “I’ll stay here until it’s dark,
-and then run out. But where am I?”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba asked himself this question over and
-over again. Outside the barn he heard men
-talking and horses moving about, and with the
-wild animal smell came the sweet smell of new
-hay—the hay on which he had ridden to the city.</p>
-
-<p>“The man must be taking the hay off the
-wagon,” thought Tamba. “I can’t ride on it
-again. Well, perhaps I shall not need to. But
-I should like to know where I am, and what all
-this means.”</p>
-
-<p>For some time Tamba remained hidden in a
-dark corner of the barn, and then, suddenly, an
-animal came running in and Tamba knew at
-once what kind it was. For it was striped almost<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_88"></a>[88]</span>
-the same as was the tiger himself—with yellow
-and black—and it was a zebra.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, hello, my friend!” called Tamba, in animal
-talk, from the place where he was hidden.
-“Are you running away from the circus, too, Mr.
-Zebra?”</p>
-
-<p>“Circus? Why, no. I never was in a circus,
-though I’ve heard about such things,” the zebra
-answered. “But how did you get out of your
-cage? I didn’t know any of the tigers were
-loose.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, I got out some time ago, in a train
-wreck,” answered Tamba. “But what is the circus
-doing here, and have they had the parade
-yet?”</p>
-
-<p>“Look here!” exclaimed the zebra, as he
-chewed some wisps of hay he picked up from the
-barn floor. “I guess we don’t either of us know
-what the other is talking about. This isn’t a circus.
-This is a zoölogical park, in a big city, and
-I am one of the animals. Only, as I am very
-tame, they let me run about the yard where the
-barn is. We have some lions and tigers here,
-but they are kept in cages. Are you one of the
-zoo tigers?”</p>
-
-<p>“No,” answered Tamba. “I was a circus
-tiger. But I ran away, and I am going back to
-my jungle. So this is the zoo. Now I understand.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_89"></a>[89]</span></p>
-
-<p>What had happened was this. The farmer,
-on whose load of hay Tamba had hidden, gone to
-sleep, and been given a ride to the city, had
-brought the hay to the zoölogical park, to sell, as
-he often did. He had driven it right up to the
-barn to unload, and then it was that Tamba
-slipped off and hid before any one saw him.
-And the wild animal smell that Tamba noticed
-was the smell of the animals in the park. I suppose
-you have been to the zoölogical park near
-your own city, perhaps, and have noticed that
-smell. It is almost like a circus, so it is no wonder
-Tamba was puzzled.</p>
-
-<p>“So this is the zoo, is it?” he asked the zebra.
-“Well, I don’t want to stay here, any more than
-I want to stay in a circus. But how can I get
-away?”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, if you really belonged here, of course
-it wouldn’t be right for me to tell you how to
-get away,” said the zebra. “But as you are not
-one of the zoo animals, it will be all right for
-you to run off. You had better wait until it is
-dark, though, and then you can crawl out
-through the fence near the back of this barn.
-But you will be in the middle of a big city, and
-not in your jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>“I know,” said Tamba, sadly. “But I’m used
-to cities. I have been in parades in them often
-enough. I’ll find my way out somehow, and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_90"></a>[90]</span>
-then I’ll go to my jungle. But I wish I had
-something to eat. You haven’t a bone or a piece
-of meat, have you?”</p>
-
-<p>“I am sorry to say I have not,” replied the zebra.
-“All I eat is hay and grains. But I can
-show you where to get a drink of water.”</p>
-
-<p>“I shall like that,” said the tame tiger, “as I
-am very thirsty.”</p>
-
-<p>So the zebra showed the tiger where, in the
-barn, was a tub of water out of which the horses
-who worked in the zoölogical park got their
-drinks. There Tamba quenched his thirst and
-felt better. Then he crawled back into the dark
-corner to hide. The zebra had to go away, but
-he promised to come back and let Tamba know
-when it was dark enough for the tiger to run out
-and start afresh on his journey to the jungle.</p>
-
-<p>All that day Tamba remained hidden in the
-barn. He saw none of the other wild animals,
-and the zebra did not come back. Tamba was
-getting hungrier and hungrier, but he knew he
-dared not go out to look for anything to eat. If
-he had the park men would have seen him and
-chased after him, either catching him to put in
-one of their cages, or else sending him back to
-the circus. And Tamba did not want that.</p>
-
-<p>After a while it became darker. Tamba
-sneaked out and got another drink, and then in a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_91"></a>[91]</span>
-little while he heard the patter of the feet of his
-zebra friend on the floor of the barn.</p>
-
-<p>“Are you there, Tamba?” asked the zebra, in
-animal talk.</p>
-
-<p>“Yes,” answered the tiger.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, it’s dark enough now for you to set
-out,” went on the zebra. “Cut across the park
-over the big field you’ll see as soon as you leave
-this barn. That way will take you to a street
-where there are not so many cars and wagons as
-on the street nearest this side. It is quieter.”</p>
-
-<p>“That’s what I want—to be quiet,” said
-Tamba. “That’s why I want to go back to my
-jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba took another drink of water, for he did
-not know when he would get any more, and then,
-having said good-by to his friend, the striped
-zebra, the tame tiger went softly out of the barn
-into the night. He saw the big field and, on the
-other side, a row of lights. At first they looked
-like the lights around the circus tents when a
-night-show is being given, but when Tamba
-looked a second time he knew they were street
-lights. He was still in the big city.</p>
-
-<p>“Good-by!” called the zebra after him. “I
-hope you soon come to your jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>“Thank you! I hope so myself,” said Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>He ran across the big park field in the darkness.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_92"></a>[92]</span>
-No one saw him, for few persons are in the
-park at night. Tamba sniffed the air, and he
-smelled water. There was such a strong smell
-of water that Tamba knew it must come from a
-big river or a lake.</p>
-
-<p>“And it smells like salt water, too,” thought
-the tame tiger. “I remember that smell of salt
-water. I smelled it when they put me on a ship
-and brought me away from my jungle. Perhaps
-my jungle home is just across that salt
-water. I am going to see.”</p>
-
-<p>What Tamba smelled was the salt water of a
-big river that flowed through the city down to
-the ocean. And beyond the ocean lay the jungle.
-This much Tamba had guessed.</p>
-
-<p>“I am going toward that salt water,” said the
-tiger to himself. “This is the first time I have
-smelled it since I was on the ship. I believe,
-after all, I shall at last get to my jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>But there were quite a few adventures for
-Tamba to have before he reached his old home.</p>
-
-<p>On across the big field in the zoölogical park
-ran Tamba. He was coming nearer and nearer
-to the row of lights, nearer and nearer to the
-smell of salt water, and, also, nearer and nearer
-to a city street. It was this street that Tamba
-feared most. Once he was across that, he
-thought everything would be all right.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_93"></a>[93]</span></p>
-
-<p>He came to a low, stone wall around the park.
-He looked and listened as well as he could. He
-did not see any one who he thought would try
-to catch him.</p>
-
-<p>With a leap and a bound Tamba cleared the
-low, stone wall and found himself on the sidewalk
-of a street. Just at this place, and at this
-time, there did not happen to be any wagons,
-street cars or automobiles. Tamba was beginning
-to think everything was coming along
-finely, and that he would easily get to the salt
-water when, all of a sudden, he heard a woman
-scream. Then a man, who was with her, cried:</p>
-
-<p>“What’s the matter? What is it?”</p>
-
-<p>“A tiger! A tiger! Look, there’s a tiger
-loose in the street!”</p>
-
-<p>“Why—why—so it is!” exclaimed the man,
-who, with the woman, had come walking along
-soon after Tamba leaped over the wall. “It’s
-a real, live tiger! It must have escaped from the
-zoo. I’ll drive it back!”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, don’t! He might bite or claw you!”
-cried the woman. “Get a policeman!”</p>
-
-<p>“I will,” answered the man, and he began to
-call loudly.</p>
-
-<p>“This is no place for me!” quickly thought
-Tamba. “I must run and hide again.”</p>
-
-<p>Of course he did not know what the man and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_94"></a>[94]</span>
-woman were saying, but he knew that they would
-want to catch him, or call some one to do it, and
-so Tamba knew he must hide.</p>
-
-<p>He looked about for a good place to go. He
-did not want to jump back into the park. Up
-the street, a little way, he saw what he thought
-was the opening to a big cave. True, it was
-lighter than the entrance to the jungle cave
-where Tamba used to live, but perhaps it might
-do for a hiding place.</p>
-
-<p>“I’ll go in there!” decided Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>The tiger turned away from the man, who was
-still shouting for the police, and from the
-woman, who had covered her eyes with her
-hands, and then <a href="#i_frontis">Tamba ran for what he thought
-was the doorway of a cave</a>. At the entrance he
-could see that it stretched away out in a sort of
-dark tunnel.</p>
-
-<p>“This is the place for me!” said Tamba to
-himself, and the next moment he was running
-down some stone steps. As he went down he
-heard a loud rumbling and roaring.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! There is going to be a thunder storm,”
-thought Tamba. “I came to this cave just in
-time!”</p>
-
-<p>And, back in the street, where they had first
-seen the jungle beast, the man and woman cried:</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, the tiger ran down into the subway!
-The tiger is in the subway!”</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_95"></a>[95]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X<br />
-<small>TAMBA AT THE DOCK</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Queer as it may seem, Tamba had done
-that very thing. He had run from the
-street into the opening of a subway station
-in a big city, thinking it was a cave. And
-if you have ever been in a city where the street
-cars run underground instead of on the surface,
-as wagons and automobiles do, or instead of up
-in the air, as the elevated trains run, then you
-will understand how it was that Tamba made his
-mistake. For it was a mistake to go down into
-the subway, thinking it was a cave.</p>
-
-<p>The rumbling and roaring sound Tamba
-heard was a train coming along the subway, and,
-being underground, it made much more noise
-and racket than it would have done up on the
-surface. So it is no wonder the tame tiger
-thought it was a thunder storm.</p>
-
-<p>Down the subway steps he ran. He saw a
-dark tunnel stretching out both ways from the
-station. It was light on the station platforms<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_96"></a>[96]</span>
-where the subway trains stopped, but beyond
-this place, at each side, the dark tunnel of the
-subway stretched out.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba saw crowds of persons getting on and
-off the train, and as quick as a flash he hid behind
-a candy counter and newspaper stand, where it
-was partly dark. Tamba did not want any men
-to see him now, for since he had smelled the salt
-water he wished, more than ever, to get across
-it and back to his jungle.</p>
-
-<p>“Well,” thought the tame tiger as he crouched
-in the darkness behind the candy stand, where
-the boy tending it, busy selling evening papers,
-did not notice him, “well, I don’t know what
-this all is, nor what it’s about, but I guess this
-isn’t the kind of cave I’m looking for. It isn’t
-a jungle cave at all. It’s much too light and too
-noisy. It’s as bad as the circus. I must get out
-of here if I can.”</p>
-
-<p>But Tamba knew better than to rush out when
-so many people were coming and going. He
-wanted to wait until they had gone. But there
-were so many of them it seemed that they would
-never go. And pretty soon a policeman, and
-several excited men who did not wear blue suits
-with brass buttons ran down the subway steps.</p>
-
-<p>“He came right down here!” said one excited
-man. “My wife and I were walking along the
-stone wall by the park when the tiger jumped<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_97"></a>[97]</span>
-over right in front of us. Then he ran down
-these subway steps.”</p>
-
-<p>“Then he must be here yet,” said the policeman.
-“And if he is, we’ll catch him and send
-him back to the zoo. If he came out of one of
-the cages there he must be pretty tame, and he
-won’t hurt any one. Come on, now, everybody!
-We’ll have a tiger hunt in the subway!”</p>
-
-<p>Of course Tamba did not know what all this
-talk meant, but he knew enough to guess that the
-policeman and the other men were trying to capture
-him. So Tamba wanted to get to a better
-place to hide than just behind a newspaper stand.
-And he was lucky enough to find it.</p>
-
-<p>The lower part of the stand was hollow, like
-a big box. In it the newspaper boy kept his old
-papers, empty candy boxes and the like, and
-there was plenty of room for a tiger in there.
-There was a door to this underneath place, and
-the door happened to be open.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba saw it, saw, too, that it was dark and
-quiet underneath the stand, and so he crawled in
-under there. A better place for a runaway tiger
-could not have been found. Tamba curled
-softly up among some bundles of old papers, and
-there he stayed while the hunt was going on.</p>
-
-<p>Up and down the subway station platforms the
-policeman and the others looked for the tame
-tiger. But they never thought of looking beneath<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_98"></a>[98]</span>
-the hollow newspaper and candy stand,
-and there Tamba stayed as snugly as you please.</p>
-
-<p>“Well,” said the policeman at last to the man
-whose wife had screamed so at the first sight of
-Tamba, “I guess you made a mistake, my friend.
-You didn’t see any tiger at all. You dreamed
-it.”</p>
-
-<p>“I’m sure I didn’t dream,” said the man. “I
-wasn’t asleep. I saw that tiger come into this
-subway as plain as anything.”</p>
-
-<p>“Well, then he must have run up the steps on
-the other side,” said the policeman. “He could
-have done that before we got here. At any rate
-the tiger is gone, and we may as well go out and
-look for him somewhere else. He isn’t here!”</p>
-
-<p>The excitement soon quieted down, the searchers
-went upstairs, and Tamba was left to himself
-in his hiding place beneath the newspaper and
-candy stand.</p>
-
-<p>He could hear people walking up and down
-on the stone platform, and he could hear them
-talking. They were talking about him, as it
-happened, for the news of a tiger being loose
-somewhere in that part of the city had spread.
-But Tamba, of course, did not know what the
-men and women subway passengers were saying.
-He could hear the rumble and roar of the subway
-trains, and they sounded something like the
-trains on which the circus traveled from town to
-town. But Tamba did not come out of his hiding
-place to look at them. He stayed quietly in
-the cubby-hole under the stand.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_99"></a>[99]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_p099">
- <img src="images/i_p099.jpg" alt="" title="" />
- <br />
- <div class="caption"><a href="#Page_100">But the man was asleep and did not see the tiger.</a></div>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_100"></a>[100-<br />101]</span></p>
-
-<p>After a while, as the hours passed, it became
-quieter in the subway. There were fewer trains,
-and hardly any persons were traveling now. At
-last, along about three o’clock in the morning,
-no trains ran at all. The agent at the station
-went to sleep in his little booth, and the newspaper
-boy had gone home long ago. Tamba
-thrust his head out of his hiding place. He
-heard nothing and saw no one.</p>
-
-<p>“Now is the time for me to run out and go to
-the salt water,” said the tiger to himself. “This
-time I shall surely get back to my jungle, I
-hope.”</p>
-
-<p>Carefully and softly, Tamba crept along the
-subway platform. He passed out of the ticket
-gate, right in front of the man in the little booth,
-<a href="#i_p099">but the man was asleep and did not see the tiger</a>.</p>
-
-<p>Up the same steps down which he had run
-some hours before, Tamba now crept. He
-reached the open air and could see the stars glittering
-overhead. The night was clear and
-warm. Tamba liked it very much. Eagerly he
-sniffed the air and he smelled salt water. He
-turned his face toward the river and began to
-stalk slowly along. He wanted to cross the salt
-water and get home to his jungle.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_102"></a>[102]</span></p>
-
-<p>And as Tamba slunk along he began to remember
-how hungry he was. Since leaving the
-circus he had not eaten very much.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, if I could have a nice, juicy piece of
-meat now, how good it would taste!” thought
-Tamba. But of course no meat stores were open
-at that hour, and, if there had been, Tamba could
-not have gotten any meat from them. If the
-tiger had strolled, no matter how quietly and
-politely, into a meat shop, men would have
-driven him away, or have caught him and shut
-him up in a cage.</p>
-
-<p>“But I do want something to eat!” sadly
-thought the tiger.</p>
-
-<p>Just then a smell came to his nose that made
-him lick his lips with his red tongue and made
-him sniff very hard with his black nose.</p>
-
-<p>“I smell milk!” thought Tamba. “And it
-isn’t sour milk, either, like that which Squinty,
-the comical pig, was drinking. I smell fresh
-milk, and I wish I had some!”</p>
-
-<p>When Tamba smelled anything good he knew
-how to find it, even if he could not see it. He
-just had to “follow his nose” until he came to it.
-All jungle animals, and even your dogs and cats,
-do that. So when Tamba smelled the milk he
-turned his nose toward it and walked along until
-he came to it. And where do you suppose it
-was?</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_103"></a>[103]</span></p>
-
-<p>Why, an early-morning milkman had left a
-big can of milk in front of a grocery store, and
-it was this milk—some of which had slopped out
-from the can—that Tamba had smelled.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, here’s milk all right, that’s sure,” said
-Tamba to himself, as he sniffed around the can
-in the doorway of the store. “But how can I
-get it out? I can’t scratch or bite through this
-tin can. And, oh, how hungry I am! A good,
-big drink of milk would make me feel much better!”</p>
-
-<p>Tamba walked up and down in front of the
-can. It stood in the dark corner of a sheltered
-doorway of a store on a main street, but at that
-hour of the morning, after the milkman had
-passed, hardly any one was ever out.</p>
-
-<p>“I must have some of that milk!” thought the
-hungry Tamba. He pawed and clawed at the
-can, hoping he could find some way of getting
-it open, when, all of a sudden, he knocked the
-can right over. It fell to the sidewalk with a
-clatter and a bang, and the cover came off.</p>
-
-<p>Out gushed the white milk, and some of it
-spilled right into the big, deep cover of the can
-itself. That was enough for Tamba. Here he
-had the milk, in a dish all ready for him to lap
-it up with his red tongue, and that is just what
-he did!</p>
-
-<p>“My, but that’s good!” thought the tiger, as he<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_104"></a>[104]</span>
-drank all the milk out of the can cover. “I am
-having better luck than at first. There is even
-enough milk for that pig Squinty, if he should
-happen to come along.”</p>
-
-<p>But of course Squinty was far away. Tamba
-lapped up all the milk from the can cover, and
-then he saw where a little puddle had formed in
-a hole in the sidewalk. Tamba took that milk,
-too, and then he felt better.</p>
-
-<p>“Now to go down to the salt water and find
-my jungle,” he said to himself, as he licked up
-the last drops of milk.</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba started off down the city streets
-once more, and because every one was in bed and
-asleep no one saw him.</p>
-
-<p>But there was a very much surprised store-keeper
-who, the next morning, went to take in
-the big can of milk. It was upset and spilled.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! Some bad boys must have done this!”
-thought the store-keeper. “I must tell the police!”</p>
-
-<p>But wouldn’t he have opened wide his eyes in
-surprise if he had known a tiger had drunk the
-milk, and if he had seen Tamba doing it? Perhaps
-it is just as well he did not.</p>
-
-<p>But Tamba never knew what a sad trick he
-had played on the store-keeper. The tame tiger
-slunk along, coming nearer and nearer to the
-smell of the salt water, and at last he came to the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_105"></a>[105]</span>
-river itself. It really was a river of salt water,
-and ran down to the big ocean. But the river
-was not like those in the jungle. It had no banks
-of green vines, mud, and trees. Instead, all
-along the river were big houses built on piers
-with the water in between, and it was to one of
-these docks that Tamba slunk down in the darkness.</p>
-
-<p>Tied at the docks were big ships which would
-soon steam down the river and cross the ocean.
-Tamba knew what ships were. He had come
-across the ocean in one when he was brought
-away from the jungle.</p>
-
-<p>“I think I have found the place I want at
-last,” said Tamba to himself, as he walked slowly
-along a pier. “It is the place of the salt water
-where I landed when I first came to this country.
-Now I have only to go back the other way
-and I’ll be at my jungle. And how glad I shall
-be! Now I will find a good place to hide until
-morning, and then I’ll see what is best to do. I
-am tired now, but I had a good drink of milk
-and I can sleep.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba found a quiet hiding place on the
-ship dock and went to sleep.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_106"></a>[106]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI<br />
-<small>TAMBA ON THE SHIP</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">The sun was brightly shining when
-Tamba, the tame tiger, awakened in his
-bed at the dock. I call it a “bed” for he
-had snuggled down on a pile of bags between
-some boxes and bales, and this is as good a bed
-as ever a tiger asks for. Often they are glad
-enough to sleep on the bare boards of the circus
-cages, and even in their jungle caves they never
-have more than a pile of dried leaves or grass.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba could look out through the cracks between
-the boxes and bales and see the yellow sunshine
-on the dock. The sunshine made yellow
-stripes, almost the color of Tamba’s tawny coat.
-He could feel the soft, warm wind blowing in on
-him, and he could also smell the salt water.</p>
-
-<p>“I am in the right place at last,” thought
-Tamba. “But I must be careful. I do not want
-to be caught when I am so near my jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>You see Tamba did not know just how far it
-was down the big salt river and across the big,
-salt ocean to his jungle home. All he knew was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_107"></a>[107]</span>
-that the salt water here smelled just as the salt
-water had smelled when he was put on the ship,
-to be brought away from his home in India.</p>
-
-<p>And there were ships at the dock. Tamba
-could see them, but he knew better than to run
-out now and get on board one. For, now that it
-was daylight, there were many men on the dock.
-They were driving their wagons and drays about,
-laden as they were with things to go on board the
-ships, and Tamba knew that if he ran out, in
-plain sight of these men, some of them would
-chase him, and, perhaps, catch him.</p>
-
-<p>“So I’ll just stay hidden here until it gets dark
-again,” thought Tamba to himself. “Then I’ll
-go on one of those big floating houses, which
-Tum Tum says are called ships, and I’ll get back
-to my jungle. If I wait until night no one will
-see me, and then they can’t catch me to send me
-back to the circus.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba curled up in his snug little nest
-among the boxes and barrels on the pier, and remained
-hidden. Of course if men had come to
-take away those particular boxes they would have
-found Tamba, but, as it happened, they did not,
-and so he was safe.</p>
-
-<p>After a while, though, Tamba began to feel
-hungry. Milk for a tiger, even though it happened
-to be the full top of a can, is not enough.
-He must have meat, and meat was what Tamba<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_108"></a>[108]</span>
-wanted just then. He sniffed and smelled
-around among the boxes and bales which formed
-his nest, but no meat smell came to his nose. If
-one of the boxes had happened to have meat in
-it, perhaps Tamba might have clawed it open
-and gotten a meal. But, as it was, there was
-nothing for him to eat.</p>
-
-<p>“Never mind,” he thought to himself; “perhaps
-to-night, when I get on the ship, I can find
-something good to eat.”</p>
-
-<p>But Tamba was to have something before then.
-About noon the dock on the edge of the salty
-river, where many ships were tied, became a very
-busy place. Though Tamba did not know it,
-the ships were being loaded with things to be
-taken across the sea and sold.</p>
-
-<p>The dock was crowded with wagons, horses,
-automobiles and men, all being driven or hurrying
-to and fro, to get the big ships ready to sail.
-For there were two ships in this dock, one on
-either side of the pier, and Tamba was in a place
-called a warehouse, in between the two vessels.</p>
-
-<p>So, as I say, the dock and warehouse was a
-very busy place at noon. And as men must eat,
-as well as tigers, when the twelve o’clock whistles
-blew some of the drivers tied their horses wherever
-they happened to be, put nose-bags of oats
-on the horses’ necks, and then the men went to get
-their own dinners.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_109"></a>[109]</span></p>
-
-<p>Now, as it happened, a wagon, with a load of
-meat on it, was stopped by its driver near Tamba’s
-place. The end of the wagon, which was
-filled with big pieces of beef, pork, and mutton,
-was near the hole among the boxes where the
-tiger was hiding. And of course Tamba could
-easily smell this meat. In fact, the smell of it
-awakened him from a little sleep into which he
-had fallen.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! What’s that?” asked the tiger of himself,
-as he opened his eyes. He sniffed harder.
-The meat smell became plainer. Then he
-looked up. Right over his head was the end of
-a big wagon, where the man driving it had
-backed it to get it out of the way while he fed his
-horses and went to get his own dinner. And on
-the end of the wagon was some nice, juicy meat,
-just the kind Tamba had been fed in the circus.
-Only there was more meat than Tamba had ever
-seen at one time before.</p>
-
-<p>The meat, as I suppose you have guessed, was
-to be put on board one of the ships to feed the
-passengers and crew on its journey over the salty
-sea. Of course Tamba did not know that. All
-he knew was that he felt very hungry, and that
-here was meat.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, it was very kind of some one to bring
-me so much meat,” thought the tiger to himself.
-“I’m sure I’m much obliged to them. And they<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_110"></a>[110]</span>
-left me to myself to eat it, too. They didn’t stay
-to stare and watch me, as the folks do in the circus.
-This is very nice.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba rose up on his hind legs, and, hidden
-as he was in his snug nest, where no one saw
-him, and with the end of the meat wagon so
-easily within reach, the tame tiger made a good
-meal. Of course he chewed the ends off several
-nice pieces of meat that were meant to go on
-board the ship, but it did not completely spoil
-them, and, after all, the tame tiger was very
-hungry.</p>
-
-<p>“My, but this tastes good!” thought the tiger,
-as he took bite after bite of juicy beef. “This is
-even better than the circus. I can have as much
-as I want, and there are no bones to hurt my
-teeth. Of course I like to gnaw a bone now and
-then, but when I am as hungry as I am now I
-want just plain chunks of meat.”</p>
-
-<p>And Tamba had all he wanted. He just stood
-there and ate and ate from the back of the wagon,
-and then, licking his jaws to make them clean,
-he curled up in his nest again, and went to sleep
-once more.</p>
-
-<p>And when the man came back, after having
-had his lunch, to take the oat-bags from the heads
-of his horses, he was in such a hurry to get his
-wagon unloaded, was this man, that he never
-noticed where Tamba had chewed the meat.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_111"></a>[111]</span></p>
-
-<p>And it was not until some days later, when the
-butcher on the ship was cutting up the meat,
-that it was noticed that some of the pieces were
-chewed as if by some animal.</p>
-
-<p>“I guess the dock rats did it,” said the ship
-butcher. And he never knew it was Tamba, any
-more than the grocer knew it was a tiger that had
-tipped over his can of milk.</p>
-
-<p>After his good meal Tamba had a fine sleep,
-and it was quite dark when he awoke again. He
-peered out from between the boxes, barrels and
-bales, and he saw that there were no men, horses
-or drays at the dock. It was deserted and quiet.
-But, over at one side, Tamba could still see the
-ships, or “floating houses,” as he called them.</p>
-
-<p>“Now if I can get on one of those ships I’ll
-soon be back at my jungle,” thought Tamba to
-himself. “But I wonder which one to go on?”</p>
-
-<p>Carefully and quietly he slunk out of his hiding
-place. He walked along until he came to
-where a sort of bridge, which is called a gangplank,
-led up to the deck of the ship. Here
-Tamba smelled a smell that he very well knew.
-It was a tiger smell—the smell of a wild beast.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! If there have been wild jungle animals
-here, this is the very ship I want to go on,”
-thought Tamba. “This must have come from
-jungle-land. At no other place can I smell the
-wild animal smell. This is the ship for me!<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_112"></a>[112]</span>
-I’ll get on, hide away, and have a nice ride back
-to my jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>So, seeing no one about, Tamba walked softly
-up the plank, and stepped softly to the deck of
-the big ship. And he managed to crawl down
-into a hole without any one seeing him. Down
-in a hole, among some boxes and barrels, just like
-those on the dock, Tamba hid himself.</p>
-
-<p>“Now for my jungle!” he said to himself as he
-curled up.</p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="chapter">
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_113"></a>[113]</span></p>
-
-<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII<br />
-<small>TAMBA IN THE JUNGLE</small></h2>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="cap">Tamba, the tame tiger, had hidden himself
-away in the dark part of the ship
-called the “hold.” It was there that the
-cargo was stored—the place where boxes, barrels,
-and big wooden cases of things sent across
-the ocean were kept from the time the ship left
-one dock, until it came to another to unload.</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba had gone softly up the gangplank
-in the soft darkness of the night from the pier, he
-had dropped to the deck of the ship, and had
-crawled down what is called a “hatchway” into
-a hold. And there he hid.</p>
-
-<p>And I must tell you how it happened that
-Tamba smelled the wild animal odor on one
-ship, and not on another.</p>
-
-<p>It was because this ship had, a week or so before,
-brought from India and Africa a cargo of
-wild animals for a circus. There had been lions
-and tigers and elephants and snakes on the ship,
-and even though they had been taken off when
-the ship reached New York, some of the smell<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_114"></a>[114]</span>
-remained. And it was this which Tamba
-smelled, and which made him feel sure that this
-was a jungle-ship, or one that would take him
-back to his Indian home.</p>
-
-<p>All through the night Tamba slept in the hold
-of the ship, among the boxes and the barrels, as
-he had slept on the dock. When he awoke he
-could see a little sunshine streaming through a
-crack, and he knew another day had come.</p>
-
-<p>Just then he felt a queer motion. It was as if
-the whole ship, and he himself in it, had been
-moved along. And that is just what was happening.
-The ship was moving away from the
-dock, getting ready for the voyage across the
-ocean. Tamba knew what the motion meant.
-He had felt it before on his first sea voyage, when
-he had been brought away from the jungle.</p>
-
-<p>“Well, at last I’m on my way back to the jungle,”
-thought Tamba. “It’s lucky I found this
-ship.”</p>
-
-<p>And, indeed, Tamba was lucky in more ways
-than one.</p>
-
-<p>But, with all that, Tamba did not have a very
-good time on board the ship. In the first place
-he knew he had to stay in hiding, if he did not
-want to be seen, and, perhaps, shut up in a cage
-again, or, for all he knew, be sent back to the circus.
-The tame tiger could not go out on deck,
-as the passengers did, and breathe the fresh air<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_115"></a>[115]</span>
-and see the sunshine. Poor Tamba had to stay
-down in the dark hold, hiding among the boxes
-and barrels.</p>
-
-<p>And another thing was that he was hungry.
-After the first day when the ship was at sea, the
-tiger began to want more meat. Even though he
-had taken a good meal from the pile of beef on
-the wagon, that could not last very long.</p>
-
-<p>So, after the second night Tamba began to
-prowl about in the hold of the ship, looking for
-something to eat. He caught some big rats and
-ate them, and if the men who owned the ship had
-known that they would have been glad. For rats
-on ships do much damage, and eat some of the
-cargo. So Tamba ate the rats, but they were
-hardly enough. He wanted more.</p>
-
-<p>Then, one day he got a meal very unexpectedly.
-One of the sailors, who, perhaps, was as
-hungry as Tamba, took a big piece of meat from
-the “galley,” as the kitchen on a ship is called.
-And the sailor, who had no right to take this
-meat, stole away to eat it all by himself, so the
-cook wouldn’t see him and scold him.</p>
-
-<p>And, as it happened, the sailor picked out the
-same hold in which Tamba was hiding to come
-to eat his bit of meat which had been taken from
-the galley.</p>
-
-<p>Now Tamba was very hungry just about that
-time, and when the sailor happened to sit down<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_116"></a>[116]</span>
-on a barrel, behind which Tamba was hiding,
-and began to eat the meat, the tame tiger smelled
-it. The tiger very much wanted some for himself.</p>
-
-<p>Tamba peered out and saw the sailor sitting
-with the big chunk of cooked meat on the barrel
-beside him.</p>
-
-<p>“That’s more than he needs,” thought Tamba,
-after the sailor had eaten a bit. “I’ll take the
-rest. I don’t believe he’ll mind.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba reached up his paw, hooked his
-sharp claws into the meat, and pulled it down
-toward his hungry mouth. The sailor turned
-just in time to see his meat sliding off the barrel.</p>
-
-<p>“Here! Come back with that!” he yelled.
-“Sure, the rats are getting very bold when they
-reach up and take your meat that way! Come
-back with it!”</p>
-
-<p>The sailor leaned over the edge of the barrel,
-really thinking some bold rat had taken his meat,
-and then the sailor saw Tiger Tamba, with his
-glittering, green eyes, hiding down in the snug
-nest, chewing the meat.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, my! Oh, what do I see!” cried the
-frightened sailor. “Oh, ’tis a live tiger! Well,
-it serves me right for taking meat I’d no business
-to take! Oh, the tiger! The tiger!” and, shouting
-and yelling in fright, the sailor ran up on
-deck and never went down there again.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_117"></a>[117]</span></p>
-
-<p>He did not dare tell the other sailors what he
-had seen, for then he would have had to tell
-about taking the meat, and he did not want to do
-this.</p>
-
-<p>As no one but the frightened sailor knew that
-Tamba was on the ship, and this sailor was not
-quite sure himself, Tamba was not found out.
-The chunk of meat he took away from the sailor
-was rather large, and it saved Tamba from
-actually starving, though he was pretty hungry
-before the ship got across the ocean. But he
-managed to catch some big rats every day, and
-this helped out.</p>
-
-<p>Aside from this, and the trick he played on the
-sailor, Tamba did not have many adventures on
-the ship. He had to keep pretty closely to the
-dark hold, not daring to come out.</p>
-
-<p>Then one day the pitching and tossing came to
-an end. The ship reached the end of her voyage
-and was tied up at a dock, this time in far-off
-India. Tamba was very lucky that he had gotten
-on a vessel that took him right back to his
-own jungle-land, though he was still many miles
-from the place of the trees and tangled vines.</p>
-
-<p>The night after the ship was tied up at the
-dock in India, Tamba watched his chance, and,
-when it was dark and quiet, he slipped up on
-deck from the dark hold, and looked about. He
-could see trees and houses, but there were not so<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_118"></a>[118]</span>
-many houses as in New York, and there were
-more trees. The air, too, had a different smell.
-It had more the smell of the jungle, and as
-Tamba sniffed it he said:</p>
-
-<p>“My home can not be so very far away now.
-I will run down off this ship and find my jungle,
-and also my father and mother and my sister and
-brother. Then I shall be happy. No more circus
-for me!”</p>
-
-<p>So down the same gangplank up which he had
-walked from the dock in New York, <a href="#i_p119">Tamba ran,
-and soon he was on the Indian wharf.</a> There
-were boxes and barrels there, too, but Tamba did
-not stop to find a hiding place. He wanted to
-run off to the jungle as soon as he could.</p>
-
-<p>The tiger was hungry, so he sniffed about until
-he found a place where the ship’s cook had
-thrown overboard, on the dock, some scraps of
-meat to some hungry dogs. The dogs had not
-eaten it all, and there was a little left for Tamba.
-Then, when he had found a drink of water at a
-fountain in a street near the dock, Tamba was
-ready to set off on his journey to find his former
-jungle home.</p>
-
-<p>It was a warm, Indian night. There was no
-moon, and as there were not many lights near the
-dock, Tamba was not seen as he slunk off the ship
-and began to travel. He sniffed the warm,
-moist air, and it reminded him of his jungle
-home. He remembered it from the time when
-he had been a little, baby tiger.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_119"></a>[119]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_p119">
- <img src="images/i_p119.jpg" alt="" title="" />
- <br />
- <div class="caption"><a href="#Page_118">Tamba ran and soon he was on the Indian wharf.</a></div>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_120"></a>[120-<br />121]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Ah, that is good!” thought Tamba. “It was
-nice in the circus, and I had many good friends—Tum
-Tum, Dido, Chunky, the happy hippo,
-and Nero. And I met many good friends after
-I ran away—even Squinty was kind after he
-found I did not hurt him. But still I will like
-best to get back to my jungle.”</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba traveled on through the dark night,
-getting farther and farther away from the city
-where the ship had docked. Strange as it may
-seem, Tamba had made the trip all the way
-across the ocean himself. It was a great thing
-for a tiger to do, I think.</p>
-
-<p>Now he was in India, and that country has
-not so many large cities, nor were they as close
-together as in the United States, where Tamba
-had been in the circus. So, soon after leaving
-the dock, the tame tiger found himself out in the
-wild country. And it was not so far away to
-the jungle, though the jungle, where Tamba had
-formerly lived, was still many miles off.</p>
-
-<p>“But at last I am free, I am not in the circus,
-and I am out in the hot country that I love,”
-thought Tamba, as he slunk along under the
-trees and bushes. “Now all that I have to do is
-to find the right jungle. I can eat and drink
-now when I please. I shall not have to take<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_122"></a>[122]</span>
-chunks of meat away from sailors, nor catch
-rats.”</p>
-
-<p>In this Tamba was right. All about him, in
-the woods, were plenty of small animals on
-which he could feed. And there were pools of
-water here and there where he could drink. It
-was not like being cooped up in the hold of a
-ship, nor even like being in a circus cage.
-Tamba liked very much to be free so he could
-wander where he wished.</p>
-
-<p>He traveled on and on for many nights, hiding
-in the day-time when he came to a city or
-village, but slinking along through the tall grass,
-or among the trees, when he came to the open
-country. He grew sleek and fat, for he had
-plenty to eat. Then, too, he met other tigers
-and some lions as well as a few elephants.</p>
-
-<p>All these animals he asked where his former
-jungle cave was, but none of them could tell
-him. They did not know Tamba’s father or
-mother, nor had they ever seen his sister or
-brother.</p>
-
-<p>For many miles Tamba roamed over India,
-looking for his old home. He began to think
-he would never find it, and he was getting lonesome
-and homesick when, one evening, he came
-to the edge of a deep wood. He crossed a field
-of tall dried grass to reach the trees. He was
-on the edge of a deep, dense jungle, and, somehow,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_123"></a>[123]</span>
-as he sniffed the air, to make sure there
-were no hunters about, and no wild beasts that
-might do him harm—somehow, Tamba felt that
-he had been near this same jungle forest once
-before.</p>
-
-<p>“But it was many years ago,” he thought. “I
-wonder if there is any one here who would know
-where my father and mother are.”</p>
-
-<p>Slowly he crossed through the dried grass and
-reached the woods. In front of him he saw a
-cave, and, at the sight of it, Tamba’s heart began
-to beat faster. He had a strange feeling.</p>
-
-<p>Out in front of the cave walked a big tiger—a
-man tiger. He paced slowly up and down,
-and, after a while, a tigress came out to keep him
-company. Tamba looked past the cave and saw,
-tumbling about in the dried leaves of the jungle,
-a boy and a girl tiger. Then he heard the tigress
-say:</p>
-
-<p>“Well, our children are growing up. Soon
-they will go away from our jungle cave.”</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, I suppose so,” said the larger man tiger,
-and Tamba thought the old tiger’s voice was
-sad.</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, they will go away,” went on the tigress.
-“They will leave us as Tamba did!”</p>
-
-<p>“Tamba!” thought the surprised circus tiger
-to himself. “She knows my name!”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, but Tamba did not go away,” said the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_124"></a>[124]</span>
-old man tiger. “He was caught in a trap.
-Well do I remember that night! We have
-never seen him since.”</p>
-
-<p>“No; and I don’t suppose we ever shall,” said
-the tigress, and she, too, spoke sadly. “I would
-give a great deal if I could only see my little
-Tamba again.”</p>
-
-<p>At that Tamba could wait no longer. Trembling
-with eagerness he leaped through the
-grass, and landed in front of the cave, right between
-the other tigers.</p>
-
-<p>“Ha! What is this? Who is this strange
-tiger?” asked the old one.</p>
-
-<p>“Yes, who are you, and what do you want?”
-asked the tigress. “If you came to play with our
-boy and girl, there they are rolling in the grass.
-But you should not pounce in like that. It isn’t
-very nice and—”</p>
-
-<p>“Mother! Don’t you know me?” cried
-Tamba, in tiger talk, of course. “Why, I’m
-your own little boy tiger who was trapped and
-taken away long ago! I have been in a circus
-ever since, until I ran away, got on a ship, and
-came back to my jungle. Here I am! Don’t
-you know me, Father?”</p>
-
-<p>The old tiger opened wide his eyes and peered
-at the younger one.</p>
-
-<p>“Why—why—it is Tamba!” he growled.
-“Look, Mother, our tiger cub has come back to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_125"></a>[125]</span>
-us, almost full grown! Oh, what a fine tiger he
-is! Here!” he called to Tamba’s brother and
-sister. “Here is Tamba come back! Oh, how
-glad I am!”</p>
-
-<p>“And so am I!” cried Tamba’s mother, as she
-purred and rubbed him with her paw. “Oh, to
-think of having you back again after all these
-years! I am so glad!”</p>
-
-<p>“And I am glad to get back!” said Tamba.
-“I had a lot of adventures before I got here,
-though.”</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, do tell us about them!” purred Tamba’s
-sister. “I love to hear adventure stories.”</p>
-
-<p>“So do I,” said Tamba’s brother. “Tell us
-about the circus.”</p>
-
-<p>“First, let him have something to eat,” suggested
-Tamba’s mother. “You are hungry,
-aren’t you?” she asked.</p>
-
-<p>“Indeed I am,” said Tamba.</p>
-
-<p>Then they brought him a big chunk of meat
-from the cave, and when he had eaten that and
-had taken a drink from the pool Tamba sat down
-and began his story.</p>
-
-<p>“I have been in many places,” he said, “but,
-most of all, I like to be back in the jungle. I am
-never going away again!”</p>
-
-<p>“And to think you found us again, after all
-these years!” said his mother.</p>
-
-<p>“I think it is wonderful!” added his sister.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_126"></a>[126]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Very clever, I call it,” said his father, sort of
-laughing.</p>
-
-<p>“Oh, let Tamba tell his adventures,” begged
-his brother.</p>
-
-<p>So Tamba told them, just as I have written
-them here in this book. He told about the circus,
-about how Squinty splashed whitewash on
-him, and everything; and, my! the other jungle
-tigers laughed at the funny pig’s trick.</p>
-
-<p>It was late that night when Tamba had finished
-the story of his adventures, and then, having
-eaten some more, he was given a bed on the
-dried leaves in the cave, where he curled up
-with his father and mother and sister and
-brother.</p>
-
-<p>“Tamba,” asked his sister softly, as she
-reached over in the darkness and touched him
-with her paw, “do you think I would like it in a
-circus?”</p>
-
-<p>“No!” said Tamba. “You had better stay at
-home in the jungle. There is no place like it.
-I am glad to get back!”</p>
-
-<p>And then he went to sleep.</p>
-
-
-<p class="p2 noic">THE END</p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-<p class="noic adgroup">STORIES FOR CHILDREN</p>
-
-<p class="noic">(From four to nine years old)</p>
-
-<p class="noic adtitle">THE KNEETIME ANIMAL STORIES</p>
-
-<p class="noic adauthor">BY RICHARD BARNUM</p>
-
-<div class="figleft" id="i_bm01" style="width: 110px;">
- <img src="images/i_bm01.jpg" width="110" height="153" alt="" title="" />
-</div>
-
-<p>In all nursery literature animals have
-played a conspicuous part; and the reason
-is obvious for nothing entertains a child
-more than the antics of an animal. These
-stories abound in amusing incidents such
-as children adore and the characters are
-so full of life, so appealing to a child’s
-imagination, that none will be satisfied until
-they have met all of their favorites—Squinty,
-Slicko, Mappo, Tum Tum, etc.</p>
-
-<div class="adpage">
-<ol>
-<li>SQUINTY, THE COMICAL PIG.</li>
-<li>SLICKO, THE JUMPING SQUIRREL.</li>
-<li>MAPPO, THE MERRY MONKEY.</li>
-<li>TUM TUM, THE JOLLY ELEPHANT.</li>
-<li>DON, A RUNAWAY DOG.</li>
-<li>DIDO, THE DANCING BEAR.</li>
-<li>BLACKIE, A LOST CAT.</li>
-<li>FLOP EAR, THE FUNNY RABBIT.</li>
-<li>TINKLE, THE TRICK PONY.</li>
-<li>LIGHTFOOT, THE LEAPING GOAT.</li>
-<li>CHUNKY, THE HAPPY HIPPO.</li>
-<li>SHARP EYES, THE SILVER FOX.</li>
-<li>NERO, THE CIRCUS LION.</li>
-<li>TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER.</li>
-</ol>
-</div>
-
-<p class="noic"><i>Cloth, Large 12mo, Illustrated, Per vol. 60 cents</i></p>
-
-<p class="noi works">For sale at all bookstores or sent (postage paid) on receipt of price by
-the publishers.</p>
-
-<hr class="r20" />
-
-<p class="noic"><span class="adtitle">BARSE &amp; HOPKINS</span><br />
-Publishers            28 West 23rd Street            New York</p>
-
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-<div class="tnote">
-<p class="noi tntitle">Transcriber’s Notes:</p>
-
-<p class="smfont">Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.</p>
-
-<p class="smfont">Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-
-End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Tamba, the Tame Tiger, by Richard Barnum
-
-*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TAMBA, THE TAME TIGER ***
-
-***** This file should be named 62505-h.htm or 62505-h.zip *****
-This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
- http://www.gutenberg.org/6/2/5/0/62505/
-
-Produced by Donald Cummings and the Online Distributed
-Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
-
-Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will
-be renamed.
-
-Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
-law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
-so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
-States without permission and without paying copyright
-royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
-of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm
-concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
-and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive
-specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this
-eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook
-for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports,
-performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given
-away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks
-not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the
-trademark license, especially commercial redistribution.
-
-START: FULL LICENSE
-
-THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
-PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
-
-To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
-distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
-(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
-Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
-Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at
-www.gutenberg.org/license.
-
-Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic works
-
-1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
-and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
-(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
-the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
-destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your
-possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
-Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
-by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the
-person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph
-1.E.8.
-
-1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be
-used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
-agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
-things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
-even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
-paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this
-agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.
-
-1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the
-Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
-of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual
-works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
-States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
-United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
-claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
-displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
-all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
-that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting
-free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm
-works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
-Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily
-comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
-same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when
-you share it without charge with others.
-
-1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
-what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
-in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
-check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
-agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
-distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
-other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no
-representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
-country outside the United States.
-
-1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
-
-1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
-immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear
-prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work
-on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the
-phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed,
-performed, viewed, copied or distributed:
-
- This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
- most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no
- restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it
- under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
- eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the
- United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you
- are located before using this ebook.
-
-1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is
-derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
-contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
-copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
-the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
-redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project
-Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
-either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
-obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm
-trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
-
-1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
-with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
-must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
-additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
-will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works
-posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
-beginning of this work.
-
-1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
-License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
-work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
-
-1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
-electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
-prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
-active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
-Gutenberg-tm License.
-
-1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
-compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
-any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
-to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format
-other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official
-version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site
-(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
-to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
-of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain
-Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the
-full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
-
-1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
-performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
-unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
-
-1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
-access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
-provided that
-
-* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
- the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
- you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
- to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has
- agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
- Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
- within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
- legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
- payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
- Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
- Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
- Literary Archive Foundation."
-
-* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
- you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
- does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
- License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
- copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
- all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm
- works.
-
-* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
- any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
- electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
- receipt of the work.
-
-* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
- distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
-
-1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than
-are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
-from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The
-Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm
-trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
-
-1.F.
-
-1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
-effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
-works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
-Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
-contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
-or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
-intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
-other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
-cannot be read by your equipment.
-
-1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
-of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
-Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
-Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
-Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
-liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
-fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
-LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
-PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
-TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
-LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
-INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
-DAMAGE.
-
-1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
-defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
-receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
-written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
-received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
-with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
-with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
-lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
-or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
-opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
-the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
-without further opportunities to fix the problem.
-
-1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
-in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO
-OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
-LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
-
-1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
-warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
-damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
-violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
-agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
-limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
-unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
-remaining provisions.
-
-1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
-trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
-providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in
-accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
-production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm
-electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
-including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
-the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
-or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or
-additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any
-Defect you cause.
-
-Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
-
-Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
-electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
-computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
-exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
-from people in all walks of life.
-
-Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
-assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
-goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
-remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
-Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
-and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future
-generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
-Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
-Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at
-www.gutenberg.org
-
-
-
-Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
-
-The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
-501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
-state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
-Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
-number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
-Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
-U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
-
-The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the
-mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its
-volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous
-locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt
-Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to
-date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and
-official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact
-
-For additional contact information:
-
- Dr. Gregory B. Newby
- Chief Executive and Director
- gbnewby@pglaf.org
-
-Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
-Literary Archive Foundation
-
-Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
-spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
-increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
-freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
-array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
-($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
-status with the IRS.
-
-The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
-charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
-States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
-considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
-with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
-where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
-DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular
-state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate
-
-While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
-have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
-against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
-approach us with offers to donate.
-
-International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
-any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
-outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
-
-Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
-methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
-ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
-donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate
-
-Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works.
-
-Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
-Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be
-freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
-distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of
-volunteer support.
-
-Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
-editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
-the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
-necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
-edition.
-
-Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search
-facility: www.gutenberg.org
-
-This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
-including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
-Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
-subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
-
-
-
-</pre>
-
-</body>
-</html>
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/cover.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index e6974f5..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/cover.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_bm01.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_bm01.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index 971c44d..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_bm01.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_frontis.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_frontis.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index 926be94..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_frontis.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_p023.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_p023.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index f708b8b..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_p023.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_p043.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_p043.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index f3fa9ad..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_p043.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_p057.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_p057.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index 25ac5c3..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_p057.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_p077.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_p077.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index 0994383..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_p077.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_p099.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_p099.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index 6f6f91e..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_p099.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ
diff --git a/old/62505-h/images/i_p119.jpg b/old/62505-h/images/i_p119.jpg
deleted file mode 100644
index 39c4246..0000000
--- a/old/62505-h/images/i_p119.jpg
+++ /dev/null
Binary files differ