208 



A HISTORY OF 



would soon be dispeopled of the feebler races 

 of animals; and beasts of prey themselves 

 would want, at one time, that subsistence 

 which they lavishly destroyed at another. 



Few wild animals seek their prey in the 

 day-time ; they are then generally deterred 

 by their fears of man in the inhabited coun- 

 tries, and by the excessive heat of the sun 

 in those extensive forests that lie towards 

 the south, and in which they reign the un- 

 disputed tyrants. As soon as the morning, 

 therefore, appears, the carnivorous animals 

 retire to their dens ; and the elephant, the 

 horse, the deer, and all the hare kinds, those 

 inoffensive tenants of the plain, make their 

 appearance. But again, at night-fall, the 

 state of hostility begins ; the whole forest then 

 echoes to a variety of different bowlings. 

 Nothing can be more terrible than an African 

 landscape at the close of evening; the deep- 

 toned roarings of the lion ; the shriller yell- 

 ings of the tiger; the jackal, pursuing by the 

 scent, and barking like a dog; the hypena, 

 with a note peculiarly solitary and dreadful ; 

 but, above all, the hissing of the various kinds 

 of serpents, that then begin their call, and, 

 as I am assured, make a much louder sympho- 

 ny than the birds in our groves in a morning. 



Beasts of prey seldom devour each other ; 

 nor can any thing but the greatest degree of 

 hunger induce them to it. What they chiefly 

 seek after, is the deer, or the goat ; those 

 harmless creatures, that seem made to em- 

 bellish nature. These are either pursued or 

 surprised, and afford the most agreeable re- 

 past to their destroyers. The most usual 

 method with even the fiercest animals, is to 

 hide and crouch near some path frequented 

 by their prey ; or some water where cattle 

 come to drink; and seize them at once with 

 a bound. The lion and the tiger leap twenty 

 feet at a spring ; and this, rather than their 

 swiftness or strength, is what they have most 

 to depend upon for a supply. There is 

 scarcely one of the deer or hare kind, that is 

 not very easily capable of escaping them by its 

 swiftness ; so that whenever any of these fall 

 a prey, it must be owing to their own inatten- 

 tion. 



But there is another class of the carnivo- 

 rous kind, that hunt by the scent, and which 

 it is much more difficult to escape. It is re- 



markable, that all animals of this kind pur- 

 sue in a pack; and encourage each other by 

 their mutual cries. The jackal, the syagush, 

 the wolf, and the dog, are of this kind ; they 

 pursue with patience rather than swiftness ; 

 their prey flies first, and leaves them for miles 

 behind ; but they keep on with a constant 

 steady pace, and excite each other by a gene- 

 ral spirit of industry and emulation, till at last 

 they share the common plunder. But it too 

 often happens, that the larger beasts of prey, 

 when they hear a cry of this kind begun, pur- 

 sue the pack, and when they have hunted 

 down the animal, come in and monopolize 

 the spoil. This has given rise to the report 

 of the jackal's being the lion's provider ; when 

 the reality is, that the jackal hunts for itself, 

 and the lion is an unwelcome intruder upon 

 the fruit of his toil. 



Nevertheless, with all the powers which 

 carnivorous animals are possessed of, they 

 generally lead a life of famine and fatigue. 

 Their prey has such a variety of methods for 

 escaping, that they sometimes continue with- 

 out food for a fortnight together : but nature 

 has endowed them with a degree of patience 

 equal to the severity of their state; so that 

 as their subsistence is precarious, their ap- 

 petites are complying. They usually seize 

 their prey with a roar, either of seeming de- 

 light, or perhaps to terrify it from resistance. 

 They frequently devour it, bones and all, in 

 the most ravenous manner ; and then retire 

 to their dens, continuing inactive, till the calls 

 of hunger again excite their courage and in- 

 dustry. But as all their methods of pursuit 

 are counteracted by the arts of evasion, they 

 often continue to range without success, sup- 

 porting a state of famine for several days, nay, 

 sometimes, weeks together. Of their prey, 

 some find protection in holes, in which na- 

 ture has directed them to bury themselves ; 

 some find safety by swiftness ; and such as 

 are possessed of neither of these advantages, 

 generally herd together, and endeavour to 

 repel invasion by united force. The very 

 sheep, which to us seem so defenceless, are 

 by no means so in a state of nature ; they are 

 furnished with arms of defence, and a very 

 great degree of swiftness; but they are still 

 further assisted by their spirit of mutual de- 

 fence : the females fall into the centre ; and 



