36 BIG GAME SHOOTING 



booty. In the lower country bushbuck are a very 

 favourite prey. 



Mountain leopards are smaller and more compact 

 and more muscular than the leopard of the plains 

 and bush country. They have usually much finer 

 and thicker coats. The skin of a leopard has from 

 the earliest times and among all peoples barbarian 

 or civilised been held in the highest estimation. 

 And in truth there is no more beautiful pelt in the 

 world than that of these handsome felidae, when in 

 good condition. A well-grown African leopard will 

 measure as much as 2 feet 5 inches at the shoulders, 7 

 feet in extreme length, and will weigh 150 Ibs. Mr. 

 F. V. Kirby, who has had great experience of these 

 animals, gives as the best measurements of a low- 

 country leopard met with in his experience : Shoulder 

 height, 2 feet 7 inches ; length from tip to tip in a 

 straight line, 6 feet 1 1 inches ; girth behind shoulder, 

 35^ inches ; and girth of fore arm, 12^ inches. 



The female produces from three to four cubs, 

 though as many as five and even six have occasionally 

 been noted. 



Leopards, being essentially nocturnal beasts, are 

 only by the merest chance encountered in daytime. 

 In hill country they are even more difficult to come 

 across than in the neighbourhood of grass plains, 

 where, after the annual veldt fires, they may be 

 occasionally seen. For about an hour at dawn, how- 

 ever, if the sportsman is about the mountain where 

 leopards are known to abide, they may sometimes be 

 met with. They are, however, most shy and cunning 



