Game Animals of India, etc. 



Shensi, Northern China, presented to the British 

 Museum by Father Hugh, seems, however, to be 

 intermediate between the Manchurian and the larger 

 Indian race ; having the long hair and thick tail of the 

 former, but resembling the latter in the rich tawny 

 ground-colour of the fur, and also in the prevalence of 

 rosettes, especially on the hind-quarters. 



Black leopards are not entitled to be regarded as a 

 distinct race, being merely specially coloured individuals 

 of the larger Indian leopard, which is found not only 

 in Bengal, but apparently also in Burma and the Malay 

 countries. Hot, moist forest districts are those most 

 favourable to the development of melanism among 

 leopards, Travancore and the south of India generally 

 being the regions on the west of the Bay of Bengal 

 where these " sports " are most common, while to the 

 east they are still more abundant in Lower Burma and 

 the Malay countries. In a paper contributed to the 

 Zoologist for 1898 Colonel F. T. PoUok has suggested 

 that the reason for the prevalence of melanism in the 

 latter district is that the leopards habitually prey on 

 gibbon apes, and that their dark colour renders them 

 more inconspicuous than if they were spotted. He 

 even goes so far as to say that under such conditions 

 a leopard of the ordinary colour would starve ; but 

 this implies that all Malay leopards are black, which is 

 certainly not the case, and it is also more than doubtful 

 whether, in the case of an animal creeping along the 

 arm of a tree, a uniformly black colour would not 

 be more conspicuous than the ordinary spotted coat 

 of the leopard. A white (albino) leopard has been 

 recorded by Buchanan Hamilton. 



The most essential difference between the habits of 

 the leopard and the tiger is the facility with which the 

 former can ascend trees ; indeed, in some of the forest- 

 districts where it preys largely on monkeys, it may 

 become almost completely arboreal. This arboreal 

 habit renders the leopard more cunning than a tiger, 



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