HUNTING & SHOOTING IN CEYLON 



On our way towards the deer we passed through a 

 tiny glade of grass not more than 30 yards in diameter, 

 and just as we entered it we heard the " wuff" of a 

 startled leopard in the undergrowth on our right, but, as 

 the deer were still barking in a " park " farther ahead and 

 out of sight, we went quietly on, and I crawled through a 

 belt of bush into the open park just beyond the glade. 

 There I saw a small herd of ten or fifteen deer and one 

 buck standing about 100 yards away, all looking intently 

 in one direction, and barking at intervals. I sat down 

 and fired at the buck, but as it was getting dusk I 

 missed him clean, when, to my surprise, a leopard 

 bounded out of a clump of bushes about 20 yards on 

 my right, and, darting across my front into the main 

 jungle, disappeared before I could move. 



Quite evidently there had been two leopards at work, 

 one doing the roaring, to keep the deer occupied, and 

 the other doing the stalking. 



In such country leopards undoubtedly roar to locate 

 deer by their barking, for they do not appear to possess 

 much power of scent ; at least they never seem to use 

 it for the purpose of finding game, except perhaps in the 

 case of a "high" corpse. 



I had a rather unpleasant adventure with a leopard 

 in 1900, which I should not care to repeat. It occurred 

 during one of my regular trips to the Tamankaduwa 

 district, and luckily for me I was accompanied by my 

 cousin Roy Storey, who had just come out from home 

 on a visit to Ceylon. We had been in camp about a 

 week, and had enjoyed very pleasant sport with buffalo, 

 deer, and pig, intending presently to move on after 

 elephants, but as events turned out we moved for home 

 instead. 



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