74 NATURAL HISTORY ESSAYS 



Louis XII. hunted hare and roebuck with them. 

 Francis I. and Henri II. continued the sport, which 

 died out in the reign of Henry IV., the animals ol 

 Marie de Medici, which had been brought from 

 Florence, being the last to be so employed. Many 

 years later, Leopold I. temporarily revived the 

 pastime in Germany ; while in England a stupid 

 burlesque of it was perpetrated by the Duke of 

 Cumberland, brother to George IV. It happened 

 in this wise. Tippoo Sahib had kept a stud of 

 sixteen cheetah, and on his being killed in 1799 at 

 the storming of Seringapatam five of the animals 

 became the property of Sir Arthur Wellesley, after- 

 wards Duke of Wellington. Lord Harris having 

 obtained one or two of these leopards (perhaps 

 as a gift from Sir Arthur) the animals were brought 

 to England and presented to the Duke of Cumber- 

 land. The latter worthy turned one upon a stag 

 confined in an enclosure ; the stag lowered his 

 horns and the cheetah promptly turned and leapt the 

 fifteen foot netting without undue delay. Dashing 

 among the terrified spectators it killed a fallow deer 

 near by, and so ignominiously ended this unsports- 

 manlike experiment. These unlucky cheetahs of 

 the Duke's were so badly treated and strictly confined 

 that their former docility was lost and their disposi- 

 tion permanently altered ; one of them broke his 

 keeper's arm, and soon after this they were transferred 

 from Windsor to the Tower menagerie. 



