522 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XVII. 



the members of the Society can give answers to the questions may I express the 

 hope that they will not fail to do so ? Moreover will those who dwell in the 

 various parts of the country watch in future to see whether any migration 

 takes place ? Until I came to Lahore I paid no attention to the subject of 

 migration of this species. During the eighteen months that I was in Madras I 

 never discovered any bee-eaters nesting, and suggested that possibly the species 

 left Madras to breed. As the common bee-eater is never abundant in 

 Madras it is quite possible that there was some migration which escaped my 

 notice. 



Two other birds, which are exceedingly abundant in Lahore during the hot 

 weather but leave the place for the winter, are the Yellow-throated Sparrow 

 (Gymnorhis flavicollis) and the Purple Sun-bird (Arachnecthra asiatica). 



D. DEWAR, I.C.S. 

 Lahore, Punjab, 12th April 1906. 



No. XII.— THE BOLDNESS OF PANTHERS. 



I send you an account of an adventure a friend and his wife, not to mention 

 the dog, had with a leopard which shows what bold beasts they are occasionally. 

 I give the account as written to me : " The evening before last, my wife and I 

 had quite an adventure with a leopard. We had gone to look at a small pool 

 in a river, and were riding back along the river bed, the jungle being some 80 

 yards away from the bank. Suddenly I spotted a leopard on the edge of the 

 bank looking at the dogs.. I shouted to the dogs to come close up and immedi- 

 tely the leopard stood up. * Ikey, ' my new pedigree fox-terrier, saw him and 

 like a fool went for him. Nothing on earth would keep him off. Away went 

 the leopard across the open with the dog after him, and we close behind. At 

 the edge of the jungle the leopard turned and sprang at ' Ikey '. Somehow or 

 other, to my great surprise, he missed, and the fool of a dog turned and went for 

 the leopard, who disappeared into the jungle with the dog close behind. I 

 swore and roared at ' Ikey ' and finally to my surprise he came out again with 

 the leopard after him. For some time the leopard watched us from about 100 

 yards off but he dare not spring with me there and it was all I could do to 

 keep the dog from going back after him. All this time my wife was keeping 

 the other dog ' Topsy ' off and I told, her to gallop off and call the dogs. To 

 our great relief they followed. The leopard came out a little way, but dared 

 not pass me into the open, and I did not leave till the dogs were well away." 



Unfortunately my friend had no gun with him. He sat up next evening 

 over a goat but the leopard did not show up. 



Another instance of a leopard's boldness. Some years ago a leopard being 

 reported in the hill here, I tied up a goat and sat up for it, but it did not 

 appear. At dusk I had the goat untied and we went down the hill together, 

 when I got on my pony, giving my rifle over to a chaprasi, the goat being led 

 by another. I was riding a bit ahead along the road when the man leading 

 the goat began shouting to me, On asking the cause he called out that the 



