536 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST, SOCIETY, Vol. XXVIII. 
On July the 29th I was after Oorial in the Punjab Salt Range about 40 miles 
west of Jhelum. It had been raining hard all the morning and most of the 
night and, though I had been on the hill since seven o’clock, I had seen nothing 
worth shooting. A little before mid-day the rain stopped and I sat down on the 
edge of a small plateau to examine the valley in front of me. Immediately on my 
right were a series of low ridges, and beyond them, and forming the sky-line 
on my side of the valley, was a large ridge which, with the plateau on which I 
sat, formed the headlands of a bay enclosing the small ridges. On one of these 
latter and about 250 yards away appeared five Oorial ewes. I watched them 
to see if aram would turn up with them, but they fed to the far side of the 
sidge and were evidently without a male, so I turned my glasses on the big ridge 
beyond. 
As I did so a jarge panther glided over the crest and came down the face of 
the cliff on my side towards me. The first thing I noticed about him was that 
he looked quite grey with no trace of tawny, and when he passed over the grey 
strata of sandstone (which is the principal formation of the Salt Range), he was 
quite invisible except through glasses, I noticed that even through glasses I 
could not distinguish any spots except on his legs, but that the last fifteen inches 
of his tail looked entirely black on the upper surface. At once the explanation 
occurred to me of the ‘‘ Snow Leopards ” I have had reported to me by sports- 
men on two or three occasions in—to say the least of it—highly improbable 
localities. The leopard when killed proved to have an absolutely normal coat 
and markings. 
He had come about 80 of the 600 yards which separated us when he suddenly 
spotted the ewes. He immediately sat down on his haunches and wagged his 
tail. Never again shall I believe in the motion of the tail in the cat tribe in- 
variably expressing anger : it was as clear an expression of pleasure as one could 
see, and it was just like a big dog being shown his dinner. He then evidently 
mapped out his line of approach and started off, somehow contriving to make 
himself look about half his real size. As soon as he disappeared from view in a 
nullah about a hundred yards on the far side of the ewes I began to take a hand. 
The ewes being on the side of a ridge furthest way from me, I had to cross to the 
head of the next ridge beyond them. Just as I arrived there I heard a feeble 
** baa ’’ and a few seconds later four ewes appeared going off the way the panther 
had come and occasionally looking back towards the ravine below me. Walking 
a hundred yards down the ridge I soon saw the panther standing over a dead ewe 
licking its neck, He was only about 70 yards away so I sat down for a shot. 
As I did so he picked up the ewe by the chest with as little exertion as a cat 
picking up a mouse, and sprang straight up on to a ten foot high rock above him 
and began pushing the ewe in amongst the roots of a bush which overhung the 
top : he exposed his side nicely as he did so and I got him just above the heart, 
so that he rantwenty yards, collided with the trunk of atree and rolled down 
dead. 
I have never before had the opportunity of seeing a panther at over a hundred 
yards, and I was much struck by the evident value of his markings to him in 
the open atlongrange. Stigand,in his “‘Game of East Africa,’’ says that he 
thinks that this must be so, owing to the fact that leopards are so seldom seen 
in East Africa in open country where they are known to be numerous. 
The measurements of my beast will be of interest in view of recent correspon- 
dence. They were :—Straight between pegs, 7 feet 54 inches ; over curves 7 feet 
5? inches ; pegged out skin, 8 feet 114 inches. 
C. H. STOCKLEY, Major. 
CHAKLALA, PUNJAB, 
12th August 1921, 
