FLESH-EATING MAMMALS 5 



did a fitting opportunity offer. A civet once killed and 

 ate one of my domestic cats. I have heard of wild dogs 

 hunting both jackals and hyaenas, though I do not know 

 whether they would go so far as to eat the latter animal. 

 Hyaenas, in their turn will finish off and devour any 

 animal if helpless and weak from age or illness, without 

 regard to whether it is carnivorous or otherwise, so long 

 as it does not belong to their own species ; and they look 

 upon small dogs and cats as delicacies. The fondness of 

 leopards for domestic dogs as an article of diet is prover- 

 bial. Although it is a good general rule that no animal 

 will eat another of the same species, isolated cases of 

 cannibalism do occasionally occur more frequently 

 amongst the cat family than elsewhere, I think. 



Unlike the herb-eating animals, through whose systems, 

 in order that strength may be duly maintained, a more 

 or less regular quantity of food must pass daily, the wild 

 carnivora are by their nature suited to spend their lives 

 in alternately gorging to repletion, and undergoing 

 relatively long periods of abstinence. This adaptation to 

 conditions has, of course, been the necessary condition 

 of their survival, for, whereas under ordinary circum- 

 stances the vegetable-eating creature finds food always 

 to hand, the meat eater has to hunt for his, and to depend 

 on the superiority of his cunning and activity in order 

 to secure it. Thus, when fortune is unkind, he may have 

 to endure considerable periods on an empty stomach, and 

 it is important to his existence that this enforced hunger, 

 within due limits, shall not interfere with his bodily 

 strength. Carnivorous animals, therefore, after having 

 eaten all they can at one meal, like to lie down and sleep off 

 the immediate effects. Should anything remain of their 

 " kill," they remain as close at hand as possible, returning 

 to it in the intervals' of their waking moments, and so 



