280 A HISTORY OF 



blow, than that he effects his jump between the horse's shoulders. I* 

 the lion is stunned, and left sprawling, the horse escapes, without at 

 tempting to improve his victory ; but if the lion succeeds, he sticks tc 

 his prey, and tears the horse in pieces in a very short time. 



But it is not ameng the larger animals of the forest alone, that tnes<> 

 hostilities are carried on ; there is a minuter, and a still more treach- 

 erous contest between the lower rank of quadrupeds. The panther 

 hunts for the sheep and the goat ; the catamountain for the hare ci 

 the rabbit ; and the wild-cat for the squirrel or the mouse. In pro- 

 portion as each carnivorous animal wants strength, it uses all the as- 

 sistance of patience, assiduity, and cunning. However, the arts 01 

 these to pursue, are not so great as the tricks of their prey to escape 

 so that the power of destruction in one class is inferior to the power 

 of safety in the other. Were this otherwise, the forest would soon be 

 dispeopled of the feebler races of animals ; and beasts of prey them- 

 selves, 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 countries, 

 and by the excessive heat of the sun in those extensive forests that lie 

 towards the south, and in which they reign the undisputed tyrants. 

 As soon, therefore, as the morning 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 appear- 

 ance. 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 yellings of the tiger ; the 

 jackall, pursuing by the scent, and barking like a dog ; the hyena, 

 with a note peculiarly solitary and dreadful ; but above all, the hiss- 

 ing of the various kinds of serpents that then begin their call, and, as 

 I am assured, make a much louder symphony 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 embellish nature. These are either pursued or surpri- 

 sed, and afford the most agreeable repast 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 scarce 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 in- 

 -ttention. 



But there is another class of the carnivorous kind, that hunt by the 

 ucent, and which it is much more difficult to escape. It is remarkable 

 that all animals of this kind pursue in a pack ; and encourage each 

 'tther by their mutual cries. The jackall, the syagush, the wolf, and 



