128 SPORTING ADVENTURES IN THE FAR WEST. 



It is naturally so timid and cautious, and so far from 

 large settlements, that it is only met by accident, unless a 

 person enters the deep recesses of the forest ; but in severe 

 winters it leaves its concealment and makes bold raids on 

 the sheep, pigs, calves, foals, and even the dogs of the farm. 

 It is very destructive on such occasions, as it kills a great 

 many more animals than it can eat, and frequently leaves 

 the carcasses on the ground after it has extracted all the 

 blood through the orifice which it cuts in the neck. It 

 kills, in fact, for the sake of killing, even when gorged with 

 food ; and this propensity causes it to be thoroughly hated 

 and feared by the settlers. Sheep-raisers who take their 

 flocks to the mountains during the summer wage war to 

 the knife upon it with rifle and strychnine ; and the result 

 .is that it is disappearing as fast as the grizzly bear in some 

 sections of the country. 



During one of ray rambles along the coast region in 

 Washington Territory, I had an excellent opportunity of 

 seeing how destructive it was to the farm, what great 

 strength it possessed ; and I also had the pleasure of kill- 

 ing one which had proved a perfect Thug to the denizens 

 of the farm. While stopping at a lonely cabin that was 

 buried in the forest, some seven or eight miles from any 

 other dwelling, a cougar was so frequent a visitor to the 

 sheep-pen that it killed eight lambs and four ewes in less 

 than a fortnight. Their owner, becoming enraged, at length 

 concluded to start out in quest of it, intending, if he could 

 not kill it, to drive it some distance away at least by chas- 

 ing it with dogs, or send it to visit some other neighbor 

 whose hospitality it had not experienced. With these pur- 

 poses in view, we armed ourselves one day, and taking four 

 dogs with us which were taught to run mute w r hen held in 

 leash, we commenced scouring the woods, taking our course 

 direct from the enclosure in which the pigs and sheep were 

 usually kept at night during the winter. The dogs had 

 scarcely entered the forest before they got on the trail of 

 a thief that had been dining off young mutton the previous 

 night, and following this up as rapidly as we could, we 



