28 MARCH 1931, Page 18

In Mr. J. W. Best's . Tiger Days (Murray, 7s. 6d.)

there is no "literariness," but much solid meat of fact, observation of nature, forest trees, and sport—especially, with tigers. The author's many years' experience as a forest officer in the Central Provinces of India gave him ample opportunity for shikar, and, as he made a point of cultivating friendly relations with the jungle-folk, he has much to say also in an easy chatting style about extortionate bunnias, jungle ways and forest work, dacoity, how to make fire without matches and get water where no springs exist. And he had astonishing luck, for in his first two months in India he killed tiger, panther, bear, bison and sambhur. In a little excursus on dogs in general and his own in particular, he tells us of a dachshund who faced a wounded tigress and then after her demise brought about his own by a surfeit on bits of her. "His stomach could not keep pace with his ambitions."

* * * *