38 THE ALUMNI JOURNAL 



We reached the forests making aim to get to a ground which 

 old hunters had pointed out to us as being the most Hkely where 

 would be found the game we were principally in quest of — Leo- 

 pards. 



It was late in the afternoon when we reached our camping- 

 ground — an ideal spot with a rich grassy carpet underneath and a 

 cool sparkling stream gushing down the mountain. 



Here we loaded our rifles, packed our ammunition belts and 

 proceeded to business. 



It is unnecessary to go into every detail of our trip, suffice it is 

 to say that we killed numerous deer, antelope, wild cats and leo- 

 pards, and that personally, I enjoyed every hour of my strenuous 

 trip. 



Everything went on gloriously, I might say hilariously, until the 

 very evening on which we closed our hunting trip and had made ar- 

 rangements to return to civilization. 



On the day in ciuestion we had been away from camp from early 

 morning, and as it was a day of considerable excitement attended 

 with the killing of many wild cats and deer we were pretty well 

 fagged out, when we decided on returning to camp and closing 

 otir trip. We were returning slowly and chatting in a jovial man- 

 ner over the success and jollity of our excursion, when my brother 

 suddenly stood still pointing in the direction of an tmusually dense 

 thicket of underwood exclaimed "look"! Following the direction 

 of his hand I saw three leopard cubs staring straight at us with 

 eyes like l)alls of fire. 



We "sized them u])" carefully and failed to see the mother, my 

 brother insisting she was in the immediate vicinity — an insistence 

 which made me doubly cautious. My brother caught the citbs and 

 as he was about placing them in his hunting sack for the purpose 

 of taking them with us, I heard a slight noise in the branches over- 

 head, on looking up I had scarcely time to notice the wild eyed, blood 

 thirsty mother leopard, when with a piercing howl she sprang from 

 the bough right in the direction of my brother. The huge beast 

 meant business and no doubt would have lieen successful in a very re- 

 grettable business indeed, were it not that in her anxiety she did 

 not study her leap and sprang too far. Quick as thought I raised 

 my rifle and fired directly into the enraged beast. My shot stag- 

 gered her only, the bullet evidently not reaching the vital spot 



