THE CAT TRIBE 



57 



PHttt k) A. S. Rutland &> Son, 



KAFFIR CAT 



The common -wild cat of Soul A Africa. It will interbreed -with 

 domestic cats 



It is, however, much stronger than the tame 

 cats, with which it interbreeds freely. In the 

 Colony it is often difficult to keep male tame 

 cats, for the wild Kaffir cats come down and 

 fight them in the breeding-season. The 

 Egyptian cat is really the same animal, slightly 

 modified by climate. A very distinct species 

 is the JUNGLE-CAT, ranging from India, 

 through Baluchistan, Syria, and East Africa, 

 and called in Hindustani the CHAUS. The 

 European striped wild cat extends to the 

 Himalaya, where the range of the lion- 

 coloured, yellow-eyed chaus begins. The 

 chaus has a few black bars inside the legs, 

 which vary in different regions. The Indian 

 chaus has only one distinctly marked ; the Kaffir cat has four or five. The EGYPTIAN FETTERED 

 CAT has been said to be the origin of the domestic and sacred cats of Egypt. A male chaus is 

 most formidable when " cornered." General Hamilton chased one, which had prowled into the 

 cantonments on the lookout for fowls, into a fence. " After a long time I spied the cat squatting 

 in a hedge," he writes, " and called for the dogs. When they came, I knelt down and began 

 clapping my hands and cheering them on. The cat suddenly made a clean spring at my face. 

 I had just time to catch it as one would a cricket-ball, and, giving its ribs a strong squeeze, threw 

 it to the dogs ; but not before it had made its teeth meet in my arm just above the wrist. For some 

 weeks I had to carry my arm in a sling, and I shall carry the marks of the bite to my grave." 



The chaus, as will be seen from the above, wanders boldly down into the outskirts of large 

 towns, cantonments, and bungalows, on the lookout for chickens and pigeons. Its favourite plan 

 is to lie up at dawn in some piece of thick cover near to where the poultry wander out to scratch, 

 feed, and bask. It then pounces on the nearest unhappy hen and rushes off with it into cover. 

 An acquaintance of the writer once had a number of fine Indian game fowl, of which he was not 

 a little proud. He noticed that one was missing every morning for three days, and, not being 

 able to discover the robber, shut them up in a hen-house. Next morning he heard a great com- 

 motion outside, and one of his bearers came running in to say that a leopard was in the hen- 

 house. As this was only built of 

 bamboo or some such light material, it 

 did not seem probable that a leopard 

 would stay there. Getting his rifle, he 

 went out into the compound, and cau- 

 tiously approached the hen-house, in 

 which the fowls were still making loud 

 protests and cries of alarm. The door 

 was shut ; but some creature certainly 

 not a leopard might have squeezed in 

 through the small entrance used by the 

 hens. He opened the door, and saw at 

 the back of the hen-house a chaus 

 sitting, with all its fur on end, looking 

 almost as large as a small leopard. On 

 the floor was one dead fowl. The 



, , , f ,. , Phttt by A. S. Rutland & Stni 



impudent jungle-cat rushed for the door, AFRICAN CHAUS> OR JUNGLE _ C AT 



but had the coolness to seize the hen The ckaut it tht lnttn and African e^aUm O four -wilder hit 



3 equally strong and savage 



I 



