106 LEOPARDS AND PANTHERS. 



midnight, we heard and saw the deer running 

 about as if they were much frightened ; and at 

 last we got sight of the leopard on his retreat, at 

 the moment he leaped on the wall. 



Our guns at the time were pointed through the 

 Venetian blinds of the window, in a direction to 

 shoot at any thing on the ground, or at the height 

 of a leopard, and when we saw him on the wall, 

 we could not elevate them sufficiently, or we 

 might have killed him. It was a moon-light 

 night, and he kept in the shade all the time he 

 was in the compound. He continued his depre- 

 dations every night, and the last deer that he 

 carried off, which we saw on the outside partly 

 devoured, was a very large buck, of the full size 

 of our forest deer. It surprised us to think how 

 he could possibly have carried it over the wall ; 

 and upon examining the place minutely, we at 

 length discovered the marks of his claws, fresh 

 and distinct, on the stalk of a mango tree; by 

 which it appeared that he must have ascended 

 the tree with the deer in his mouth, and sprung 

 from it upon the wall; the distance of which, 

 from any branch of the tree sufficiently strong to 

 bear such a weight, must have been seven or 

 eight feet. 



