OKDER V. THE CARNIVORA. 141 



clojT on boiird sliip, wliicli was a great favorite with tbem, always treating liim 

 with marked kindness and tenderness. When one of thcni was fed with a 

 fowl which had died, lie seized it, and, after tearing it a little, and sucking 

 the blood, amused himself for hours in throwing it about and jumping after 

 it, as a cat plays with a mouse before it is quite dead. 



The Ja(;l'au (Felts oiica). (Sec Plate XIII.) — The jaguar, or 

 jVuicrican panther, as he is sometimes called, is, next to the tiger, the 

 strongest and most terrible of the Feline family. lie is beautifully spotted 

 with rings more or less complete, and containing smaller spots on a deeper 

 ground tint. The general color is yellowish, and tiie markings are of a 

 deep chocolate-brown. lie is a native of South America, but altliough 

 found from Patagonia to the Isthmus of Daricn, he is most abundant in 

 Paraguay and Brazil. 



lie is a ferocious and destructive beast, inhabits the forests, and seeks his 

 prey by watching, or by openly seizing cattle or horses in the enclosures. 

 His depredations among the herds of horses which graze on the prairies of 

 Paraguay are vast and terrible. Swift as lightning he darts npon his prey, 

 overthrows him by weight, or breaks his neck by a blow of his paw, or by 

 a sudden wrench of the nose, at which practice the jaguar shows an extraor- 

 dinary skill and singular intelligence. Ilis strength is so great, he can 

 easily drag otl" a full-sized horse. D'Azara, the traveller and naturalist, 

 relates tint he caused the body of a horse, which had just fallen a victim to 

 this animal, to be drawn within nuiskct-shot of a tree in which he intended 

 to pass the night, anticipating that the jaguar would return in the course of 

 it to his victim ; but, while he was gone to prepare for the adventure, the 

 animal returned from the opposite side of a large and deep river, and, 

 seizing the horse with his teeth, drew it for about sixty paces to the water, 

 swam across with his prey, and then drew it into a neighboring wood, in 

 sight, the whole time, of a person whom D'Azara had left concealed to ob- 

 serve what might happen before his return. 



His food, however, is ^•ery various, and sometimes, it is said, he feeds on 

 fish, and will even go into the water to catch them, — which in.^tinet has been 

 observed often in the common cat. 



He is an expert climber, and Sonnini tells us that he has seen the 

 jirint of the jaguar's claws on the bark at the top of a tree fifty feet in height 

 and without branches. lie sometimes feeds on monkeys, but they are gen- 

 erally too active for him : having the power to swing themselves from branch 

 to branch with wonderful swiftness, they are soon beyond his reach. After 

 horses, oxen and sheep are his favorite prey, and his devastations among 

 them ai'e often very extensive. On account of this, efforts are constantly 

 made to destroy him. He is hunted with dogs, which run him to bay, or 



