ge, but the sound had the effect of
bringing the two victims around with a sudden start, and then I saw the
girl's face--she was not Dian! I could have wept for relief.

And now, as the two stood frozen in terror, I saw the author of that
fearsome sound creeping stealthily into view. It was a huge
tiger--such as hunted the great Bos through the jungles primeval when
the world was young. In contour and markings it was not unlike the
noblest of the Bengals of our own world, but as its dimensions were
exaggerated to colossal proportions so too were its colorings
exaggerated. Its vivid yellows fairly screamed aloud; its whites were
as eider down; its blacks glossy as the finest anthracite coal, and its
coat long and shaggy as a mountain goat. That it is a beautiful animal
there is no gainsaying, but if its size and colors are magnified here
within Pellucidar, so is the ferocity of its disposition. It is not
the occasional member of its species that is a man hunter--all are man
hunters; but they do not confine their foraging to man alone, for there
is no flesh or fish within Pellucidar that they will not eat with
relish in the constant efforts which they make to furnish their huge
carcasses with sufficient sustenance to maintain their mighty thews.

Upon one side of the doomed pair the thag bellowed and advanced, and
upon the other tarag, the frightful, crept toward them with gaping
mouth and dripping fangs.

The man seized the spears, handing one of them to the woman. At the
sound of the roaring of the tiger the bull's bellowing became a
veritable frenzy of rageful noise. Never in my life had I heard such
an infernal din as the two brutes made, and to think it was all lost
upon the hideous reptiles for whom the show was staged!

The thag was charging now from one side, and the tarag from the other.
The two puny things standing between them seemed already lost, but at
the very moment that the beasts were upon them the man grasped his
companion by the arm and together they leaped to one side, while the
frenzied creatures came together like locomotives in collision.

There ensued a battle royal which for sustained and frightful ferocity
transcends the power of imagination or description. Time and again the
colossal bull tossed the enormous tiger high into the air, but each
time that the huge cat touched the ground he returned to the encounter
with apparently undiminished strength, and seemingly increased ire.

F