LEOPARD. 39 i 



dogs, leopards l are frequently brought into collision with Indian villagers ; and a 

 leopard being mobbed in a garden, or field of sugar-cane or standing corn, from 

 which he will charge several times, and bite and claw half a dozen before lie is 

 despatched or makes his escape, is no uncommon occurrence in India. At night 

 leopards frequently find their way into goat-folds or calf-pens, climbing over walls 

 or the roofs of native huts in their burglarious inroads, and carrying off their prey 

 with great boldness and agility. They appear to have a peculiar penchant for 

 dogs ; and I have known many villages in parts of Mysore where leopards were 

 numerous, in which not a dog was to be found, or perchance but one or two, 

 which would be pointed out by their owners as very lucky ones, they having 



LEOPARD ON THE PROWL. 



escaped sometimes from the very clutches of their unceasing foe, whilst their 

 companions had successively fallen victims to his stealthy attacks." 



This partiality of the leopard for dogs seems to be characteristic of the animal 

 from one end of India to the other, and there are many instances on record where 

 leopards in the hill-stations have swooped down in broad daylight and carried off 

 pet dogs from before the very eyes of their European masters or mistresses. It is 

 but rarely that leopards take to man-eating, but instances do occur, one of which 

 came under the notice of the present writer some years ago, when a leopard carried 

 off a considerable number of persons from a village in Kashmir. In Africa the 

 general habits of the leopard appear to be very much the same as in India, Sir 

 Samuel Baker relating how, on one occasion, a dog was carried off from the very 

 middle of his camp by one of these marauders. 



In addition to dogs, which can, of course, be obtained only in the neighbour- 



1 In this extract we omit Mr. Sanderson's use of the word panther whenever he refers to the leopard. 



