320 THE HIGHLANDS OF CENTEAL INDIA. | 



sportsman out of a high perch on a tree in the Chindwara 

 district. And lastly, his powers of offence are scarcely inferior 

 to those of the tiger himself; and are amply sufficient to be 

 the death of any man he gets hold of. When stationed at 

 Damoh near Jubbulpur, with a detachment of my regiment, I 

 shot seven panthers and leopards in less than a month, within 

 a few miles of the station, chiefly by driving them out with 

 beaters ; all of them charged who had the power to do so ; but 

 the little cherub who watches over " griffins" got us out of it 

 without damage either to myself or the beaters. One of the 

 smaller species, really not more than five feet long I believe, 

 charged me three several times up a bank to the very muzzle 

 of my rifle (of which I luckily had a couple), falling back 

 each time to the shot, but not dreaming of trying to escape, 

 and dying at last at my feet with her teeth closed on the root 

 of a small tree. This animal had about six inches of the quill 

 of a porcupine broken off in her chest. Another jumped on 

 my horse, when passing through some long grass, before she 

 was fired at at all ; and after being kicked off charged my 

 groom and gun carrier, who barely escaped by fleeing for their 

 lives, leaving my only gun in the possession of the leopard. 

 I had to ride to cantonments for another rifle, and to get to- 

 gether some beaters. When we returned, I took up my post 

 on a rock which overlooked the patch of grass ; and the beaters 

 had scarcely commenced their noise before the leopard went 

 at them like an arrow. An accident would certainly have 

 happened this time had my shots failed to stop this devil 

 incarnate before she reached them. She had cubs in the 

 grass, which accounted for her fury ; but a tigress would have 

 abandoned them to their fate in a similar case. The last I 

 killed was a man-eater, which took up his post among the 

 high crops surrounding a village, and killed and dragged in 



