13 Tiger Adventure Read Online Free PDF

Then he can’t hurt you - except with his claws.’ He saw that his brother was worried.
    ‘I was just kidding,’ Hal said. ‘You stay here safe and sound and I’ll go up and get it.’
    ‘Not on your life,’ said Roger. ‘I saw it. I’ll bring it down.’
    Hal was pleased. He wanted to train his young brother to face danger. That would not be difficult. Roger had a lot of Hunt courage.
    He climbed the tree. The panda was rolled up, sound asleep. Roger tied the mouth shut. He didn’t know what to do about those long sharp claws on all four feet. Just have to take a chance.
    He started down with the heavy animal in his arm. That left only one arm to clutch the branches. What if the beast woke up? It would struggle and fight and cut with its four sets of razors.
    Then he noticed that the creature’s eyes were wide open. The panda was already awake. But it was as quiet during this jolting trip as if it were being rocked in a cradle.
    Most animals would have screamed and struggled. But this one didn’t know anything about men. It didn’t know how cruel men could be.
    But it pat up one foot and pulled the twine from its jaws. Still it did not bite. It was an instant friendship between boy and beast.
    Roger and his burden reached the ground safely. Hal was amazed.
    friendly little fellow,’ he said.
    ‘Not so little. He nearly broke my arm.’
    ‘Well, you were lucky that he wasn’t full-grown. When he grows up he will weigh more than a hundred pounds. What a beautiful red overcoat he is wearing. He needs that, because his homeland is about twelve thousand feet up the mountain. He comes down to eat bamboo shoots.’
    ‘Doesn’t he eat anything else?’
    ‘Yes. For dessert he fancies insects, wasps, bees, hornets, and he kills them so quickly between those sharp teeth that they don’t have a chance to sting him.’
    ‘I’m going to call him Pan,’ said Roger.
    Hal lifted one of Pan’s front feet.
    ‘See. It’s almost a hand, not a foot. Hardly any animal except the monkey has a thumb. This panda can pick up anything between his thumb and what serves as fingers, Try picking something up without using your thumb. You do much better with a thumb. Put him down.’
    ‘He’ll run away.’
    ‘No, I don’t think so. He likes you.’
    Placed on the ground, Pan looked about as if deciding what to do, then climbed up Roger’s trouser-leg into his arms.
    And so he rode home. He was not put in a cage. He was allowed to run free inside the cabin or out.
    His life consisted of eating and playing.
    ‘He’s a clown,’ Hal said. You remember the clowns in the circus? Well, Pan is the clown of the animal world.’
    Pan the clown was full of tricks. News of his arrival at the Hunt camp soon got around and people came from near and far to see him perform.
    Pan was part bear, part raccoon. Like a raccoon, he was clever. Like a bear, he could do all sorts of stunts. The difference was that a bear has to be trained to do stunts, but the panda could do them naturally without being trained.
    Pan’s first adventure was to climb up on top of the leopard’s cage. That annoyed the beautiful cat. When a leopard is angry it raises its tail as straight as a mast.
    The tip of the tail stuck out through the wire and Pan gave it a good yank. What a roar he got out of the bad-tempered beauty.
    Now Pan jumped over on top of the cage that held the King of Beasts. The tiger was so large that the tip of his tail was within reach. Pan tweaked it. The tiger did not roar. His purr was as loud as the sound a dozen house cats would make all purring together.
    Hal took a chance. He opened the door of the cage just wide enough for Pan to squeeze in. What would the tiger do?
    Tigers eat living animals of any size, as small as a rat or as big as a sambar. But the tiger had just been fed and he enjoyed the cute antics of his roly-poly visitor. He licked the furry bear-raccoon as if Pan were one of his own cubs.
    Take him out,’ someone yelled.