MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 187 



No. II.— A PORCtJPINE ATTACKING A DEAD PANTHER. 



( With a block.) 



On 8th April I shot a panther over a kill at about 7-30 p.m. The brute 

 dashed off about 100 yards where I heard what I took to be its death 

 groan. Half a minute or so later I heard a guttural sound twice repeated, 

 which I could only put down to the panther, though it was unlike anything 

 I had heard before ; in fact I put it down to the panther bringing up some of 

 the meat he had eaten. 



As it was dark I left the panther for the night, and on returning in the 

 morning found it lying dead ( where I had heard the death groan ) and 

 bristling with porcupine quills. 



There was a row of quills from the back of the head down to the middle 

 of the back and a lot more in the chest, neck and forearm of the panther, 

 also one in the very tip of its nose. 



It was clear that the porcupine had attacked the panther after it was 

 dead. Had the panther made any movement some of the quills would 

 have been displaced, whereas the only quills in the ground were half- 

 a-dozen firmly stuck in, obviously by the porcupine while attacking 

 the panther. Over five dozen quills were picked out of the panther 

 and it was noteworthy that they had all been fired at vital parts of 

 its body. 



The guttural sound which I had heard the previous night may have been 

 the cry of the porcupine, a sound with which I am not acquainted. The 

 dying rush of the panther may have carried it close to the porcupine and 

 led it to think that it was being attacked. The deliberate way in which 



