100 JAGUAR, BEAR AND PUMA 



most savage beasts which cause them to act contrary 

 to their natures." This was his only explanation of 

 an astonishing incident he heard in South America 

 of two children playing with a jaguar in the forest, 

 and the animal playfully responding to the mock 

 attacks they made on it. It is curiously like the 

 incident related in Atkinson's Travels in Siberia. In 

 this case a woodcutter and his wife returning to their 

 cottage missed their two children, a boy and a girl, 

 and in great alarm they went out to look for them. 

 Hearing shouts and laughter they hastened to the 

 spot, and were horrified to see a big brown bear 

 looking very happy with his tongue lolling out, and 

 the woodman's little boy sitting on his back trying 

 to make him go, and the little girl pulling at the 

 bear's head. At a shout from the man, the bear shook 

 the children off and trotted away into the forest, -i 



It is hardly necessary to say that the great Hum- 

 boldt knew little or nothing about the animal mind, 

 since it can't be measured with a foot-rule or weighed 

 in a pair of scales or analysed. But the scientist 

 rightly considers that his mission on earth is to explain 

 everything, and when he can't find an explanation, to 

 substitute the precious illuminating word or phrase; 

 hence the tiger's " beneficent impulses." 



Finally, we have the still more remarkable case of 

 the puma, the lion of South America, a powerful, 

 ferocious cat, destructive to cattle and horse, sheep, 

 goat and pig, but never known to attack a human 

 being. The Argentine gauchos call him the " man's 

 friend," or the " Christian's friend," and assert that 



