186 MAMMALIA—JAGUAR. 
the jaguar, on the contrary, is marked by one or two regular longitudina 
lines of broad, elongated deep black patches, sometimes extending severa. 
inches in length, and occasionally forming an almost continuous band from 
between the shoulders to the tail. The black rings towards the tip of the 
latter are also more completely circular than in the leopard.” 
The jaguar is a solitary animal, residing in forests, especially near large 
rivers. Heis an excellent swimmer. D’Azara tells us, partly from per- 
sonal observation, that, after a jaguar had destroyed a horse, he dragged 
the body sixty paces, and then swam with it over a broad and deep river. 
He is equally expert at climbing. ‘I have seen,” says M. Sonini, ‘in the 
forests of Guiana, the prints left by the claws of the jaguar on the smooth 
bark of a tree from forty to fifty feet in height, measuring about a foot and 
a half in circumference, and clothed with branches near its summit alone. 
It was easy to follow, with the eye, the efforts which the animal had made 
to reach the branches: although his talons had been thrust deeply into the 
body of the tree, he had met with several slips, but he had always recovered 
his ground, and, attracted no doubt’ by some favorite object of prey, had at 
length succeeded in gaining the very top.3 
The jaguar lies in ambush for his prey, on which he pounces suddenly, 
and his great muscular strength enables him instantly to bear it to the 
ground. Man he does not often attack, and never but by stealth. While 
M. Sonini was travelling in Guiana, his party, was closely dogged for three 
nights by one of these animals, which eluded all their attempts to shoot it, 
and would, doubtless, have carried off any individual who might have un- 
guardedly exposed himself. 
Ferocious as he is in-his wild state, the jaguar, when captive, becomes 
tame and even mild, and is particularly fond 6f licking the hands of those 
with whom he is familiar. 
The taking of the jaguar forms a portion of the warlike features distin- 
guishing the Indians of South America, particularly the Llaneros, or men 
of the plains. One inducement a Llanero has in pursuing the jaguar, isthe 
honor of the feat—for the value of its skin and the little depredations it 
commits on the flocks, would never, I apprehend, (says a late traveller in 
South America,) induce him to risk a single combat with such fierce 
animals; but there is a stronger stimulus, viz. that killing seven jaguars, 
or six tigers, will give him the title of .gwapo, or warrior, and the privilege 
of choosing the fattest virgin in the tribe, for his companion; for with them, 
the lady who is most en don point, is most beautiful. This alone is a 
sufficient inducement; and they endeavor to complete their task as early 
as the age of seventeen. At the approach of the breeding season, they 
watch with great assiduity the battles that take place between the male and 
the female, as this is a sure indication of her littering, not wishing to have 
the male know where she deposits the cubs, as some naturalists assert that 
he eats them; others, that he hugs them to death. However this be, she 
