40 NATURAL HISTORf. 



lighting their midnight lamps among the trees. But soon the road became darker, and Donald, the 

 noW pricked his ears uneasily as he turned into a jungle-path which led towards the stream. Donaia 

 snuffed the air and soon redoubled his pace, with ears set close back, nostrils dilated, and bristling 

 mane. Onward he sped, and at last the angry growl of a Tiger in full chase behind roused MacNab 

 to the full peril of his position, and chilled his blood with the thought that his pursuer was fast gaining 

 Around, and that at any moment he might feel the clutch of his hungry and relentless claws. Here 

 was a dilemma, the cold creek before him, and the hot breath of the Tiger in the rear. A moment or 

 two were gained by tossing his hat behind him, and then Donald cleared the stream at a bound. The 

 Tiger lost hia scent, and Mr. MacNab reached home in safety, by what he delighted to describe as a 



miraculous escape." 



To us who " live at home at ease," life would seem to be hardly bearable in a place when one is 

 liable, any day, to meet with such an adventure as this with every chance, too, of a less pleasant 

 termination. But it is astonishing how indifferent to the presence of wild beasts the inhabitants of 

 these countries become. Even Europeans soon acquire the same fearlessness, or, rather, apathy. Of 

 this Mr. Thomson gives a striking illustration : " In these sparse settlements of Malays and 

 Chinese, Roman Catholic missionaries are at work. I once fell in with one of these priests, shod 

 with straw sandals, and walking alone towards Bukit, Mer-tangrim (the pointed hill), to visit a sick 

 convert who had a clearing upon the mountain-side. His path lay through a region infested with 

 wild animals; and when I inquired if he had no dread of Tigers, he pointed to his Chinese 

 umbrella, his only weapon, and assured me that with a similar instrument a friend of his had 

 driven off the attack of a Tiger not very far from where we stood. But the nervous shock which 

 followed that triumph had cost the courageous missionary his life." 



THE LEOPARD* 



The Leopard, or Panther, is undoubtedly the third in importance and interest of the great Cats. 

 From a historical point of view it is more interesting than the Tiger, and would naturally come 

 immediately after the Lion, but its size, ferocity, and beauty are so very inferior to the Tiger's that 

 it must needs yield to the glorious Bengalee. In the matter of beauty alone it is eclipsed by the 

 Jaguar, but the fact of its having been known from very ancient times, and that of its occurrence 

 in our own hemisphere, must decide xis, in the absence of any important characters, anatomical or 

 otherwise, to give it the precedence of its very nearly related American cousin. 



The Leopard was the only one of the greater feline animals, except the Lion and Tiger, that 

 seems to have been known to the ancients. It is always represented as drawing the chariot of 

 Bacchus, and the forlorn Ariadne is sculptured as riding on one of the spotted steeds of her divine lover. 

 The Panther was also constantly used in the barbarous sports of the amphitheatre, and, in common 

 with the Lion and Tiger, has been both executioner and grave to many a bold-hearted martyr. 



The Leopard's skin was a favourite mantle in the olden times in Greece. In the " Iliad," Homer, 

 speaking of Menelaus, says 



" With a Pard's spotted hide his shoulders broad 

 He mantled o'er," 



and the Leopard, or Panther, is given in the " Odyssey " as one of the forms assumed by Proteus, " the 

 Ancient of the Deep." 



A curious ancient superstition about the Leopard is embodied in its name. It was thought not 

 to be actually the same animal as the Panther or Pard, but to be a mongrel or hybrid between 

 the male Pard and the Lioness : hence it was called the Lion-panther, or Leopardus. This error, as 

 Archbishop Trench tells us, " has lasted into modern times ; thus Fuller, ' Leopards and Mules are 

 properly no creatures.' " Another word-combination was made by the Romans when wishing to find 

 a name for the Giraffe. It is " a creature combining, though with infinitely more grace, yet some of 

 the height and even the proportions of a Camel, with the spotted skin of the Pard" They called it 

 " Camelopardus," the Camel-panther. 



Some authors give it as their opinion that the Leopard outshines all the great beasts of prey 



* Felis pai-dus. 





