TIGERS, LEOPARDS, AND BEARS 279 



They seldom attack adults, either women or men, but 

 they frequently carry off children. 



Early in my service I was subordinate magistrate 

 at Etawah, a district not far from Agra. In parts of 

 that district, along the banks of the river Chumbul, 

 there are very extensive ravines. They form a perfect 

 labyrinth over many miles of country. In these 

 ravines the wolves abounded. They were not much 

 seen in the day, but at night they roamed abroad, 

 prowled about the villages, and if they found a door 

 open would enter and bear off a child. It is so long ago 

 that I may exaggerate, but I think that hardly a week 

 passed without some such case being reported. 



Now it was the belief of the natives that in some 

 rare instances the child thus seized was not devoured, 

 but was brought up by some she-wolf with her own 

 offspring. The belief was not confined to that district, 

 but was universal ; it was entertained even by some 

 Europeans : that is, they accepted as reliable the state- 

 ments that from time to time appeared of the discovery 

 of children that wolves had thus brought up. 



Some years after, when I was magistrate of Muttra, 

 the discovery of such a child was reported ; it was a 

 boy. He had been found wandering, if I remember 

 aright, near some ravines. When found, he was 

 perfectly unclothed, and though apparently at least 

 twelve years old, he was unable to utter any articulate 

 sound. The villagers who had discovered the boy 

 had taken him to the nearest police-station, describing 

 him as a "wolf-child," and the police as such for- 

 warded him on to me. 



