tiger. And this is why,
when the cat in the story saw the tiger, her nephew, fighting with the
man, she ran away as hard as she could.

_The Story._

There were once a dog and a cat. It was a very rainy day, and some men
were eating their dinner inside their house. The cat sat inside too,
eating her dinner, and the dog sat on the door-step. The cat called
out to the dog, "I am a high-caste person, and you are a very
low-caste person." "Oh," said the dog, "not at all. I am the
high-caste person and you are of very low caste. You eat all the men's
dinner up, and snatch the food from their hands just as they are
putting it into their mouths. And you scratch them, and they beat you;
while I sit away from them, and so they don't beat me. And if they
_give_ me any dinner I'll eat it; but if they don't, I won't." "Oh,"
says the cat, "not a bit of it. I eat nice clean food; but you eat
nasty, dirty food, which the men have thrown away." "No," said the
dog, "I am high caste and you are very low caste, for if I gave you a
slap you would tumble down directly." "No, no!" said the cat. And they
went on disputing and began to fight, till the dog said, "Very well,
let us go to the wise jackal and ask him which of us is the better."
"Good," said the cat. So they went to the jackal and asked him. Said
the cat, "I am of the higher caste, and the dog is of the lower
caste." "No," said the jackal, "the dog is of the higher caste." The
cat said, "No," and the jackal said, "Yes," and they began to fight.
Then the jackal and the dog proposed to go and ask a great big beast
who lived in the jungle and was like a tiger. But the cat said, "I
cannot go near a tiger or anything like one." So then they said, "When
we come near the beast, you can remain behind, and we will go on and
speak to him." So they ran into the jungle, where there was a tiger
who had been lying on the ground with a great thorn sticking in his
foot. When his aunt, the cat, saw him, she scampered off, for she was
dreadfully frightened.

The thorn had given the tiger great pain; for a long while he could
get no one to take it out, so had lain there for days. At last he had
seen a man passing by, to whom he called and said, "Take out this
thorn, and I promise I won't eat you." But the man refused through
fear, saying, "No, I won't, for you will eat me." Three times the
tiger had promised not to eat him; so at last the man took out the
thorn. Then the tiger sprang up and sa