CHAP. vi. LEOPAKDS. 311 



unless they scent food, they always make use of paths in 

 their nocturnal rambles, whether made by themselves or 

 by men or game. 



In a primitive state there is no doubt that they are 

 chiefly dependent upon the lion for their daily food, and 

 it is equally certain that they must be able to go with- 

 out eating for immense periods. The old hunters declare 

 that their numbers have much increased within their 

 memory in the districts in which there is most hunting, 

 and as so much game goes away and dies unseen of its 

 wounds, which the hyenas are easily able to find by the 

 blood-track which they leave, to say nothing of the amount 

 of meat that is purposely left for want of a use for it, there is 

 every reason to think that they must find man a better 

 purveyor than the lion, and increase accordingly. 



Among the flocks and herds there is no animal whose 

 ravages are more dreaded than those of the wild dog 

 (Canis pictus). Fortunately their visits are rare, for I 

 have known as many as fifty or sixty sheep missing after 

 one, though of course not a third of that number had been 

 killed by them ; and so daring are they that I have seen 

 them dash into a herd of cattle feeding not a hundred 

 yards from the house, and drive out a beast, disappear 

 over a rise in the ground with it, and kill it and pick its 

 bones before we could get the saddles on our horses and 

 follow them. It is a marvellous sight to see a pack of 

 them hunting, drawing cover after cover, their sharp bell- 

 like note ringing through the air, while a few of the fast- 

 est of their number take up their stations along the 

 expected line of the run the wind, the nature of the 

 ground, and the habits of the game all taken into consi- 



