184 TRAPPING WILD ANIMALS 



struck the ground, before it could recover, 

 was upon it, striking it with its head and throwing 

 it on its side. Standing on its adversary, with its 

 front feet holding it down and unmindful of the 

 snarling, biting and clawing, with a squealing 

 grunt, the boar lowered his head and with one rip- 

 ping thrust disemboweled the leopard. 



It was done quicker than the eye could follow. 

 The leopard lay where it was ; it attempted to rise, 

 but the boar, jumping and stamping upon it, it fell 

 back, gave one or two spasmodic efforts to rise and 

 turned over dead. The boar still standing over it, 

 squealing, its head rolling from side to side, its hind 

 feet sagged and, giving a squealing grunt, fell over 

 the leopard, dead. It was truly a battle royal. I 

 was thrilled. I could not move. It was the most 

 thrilling sight I think I ever witnessed. My admir- 

 ation for the boar was great ; had he not died, and 

 had been able to move off, I would have made no 

 attempt to either stop or kill him. It was a mag- 

 nificent fight, with the boar on his feet last. 



We buried the dead fighters and went on our 

 way. Coming to a small stream, I decided to make 

 camp. We built platforms in trees for sleeping 

 and as a cache for stores, cutting down the sur- 

 rounding trees and leaving a small clearing. The 

 next day I had the men cut saplings and rattan 

 to make rough transportation cages. I wanted 

 everything handy so a cage could be made in a 

 few moments. The natives could not at first under- 



