This print (wood engraving) depicts an actual incident in which G.D. Coleman and a group of Indian convict labourers were attacked by a tiger in the process of constructing a new road through the jungle in 1835. Fortunately, the tiger crashed into Coleman's surveying equipment and ran away, leaving everyone unscathed. Much of the town area was still swampland in the 1830s, and tigers posed a significant danger to the population.Tiger-hunting was a popular activity then as the government offered lucrative monetary rewards for each tiger killed. As development of the island continued, tigers became less of a threat and the last tiger was purportedly shot in 1904.
