Jungle By-Ways in India 



meat-eaters and their teeth leaving in the wounds 

 a foul poison. Lucky is the man who does not 

 lose an arm, leg, or his life once he has had a hand- 

 to-hand tussle with one of the large cats. 



' Spots ' is most often shot over a tied-up living 

 bait, and the ones most usually used are the village 

 pi dog or the goat, the latter most commonly. 

 The procedure is to have a machan built in some 

 suitable position in the track of the nightly 

 prowlings of the animal, tie up a goat below, and 

 then take up your position in the machan and wait. 



As leopards often appear early in the evening or 

 late afternoon, one has to take up one's position 

 by three o'clock or so. The idea of the goat is 

 that once he is tied up alone he will bleat for the 

 rest of the herd, and so attract the leopard to 

 the spot. When the goat acts in the manner he 

 is expected to, the leopard is often attracted as 

 desired. ' Spots ' being attracted and seeing the 

 goat, and ' spots ' advancing to make him his 

 prey, are two very different affairs, however. 



One has often had one's hopes aroused by 

 actually seeing the leopard leave the jungle for 

 the open, more or less ostentatiously advance 

 rapidly to a patch of grass and then disappear 

 from view. One waits with muscles braced and 

 eye intent on the grass patch for minutes, and one 

 begins to think hours. Suddenly a movement, 

 very slight, attracts the eye on the left ; one 

 slowly, imperceptibly turns the head. Are there 



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