CATS— GREAT AND SMALL 149 



as it is considered a worse enemy to flocks than the Wolf. It is not 

 a fast-moving animal, but possesses indomitable patience, and its 

 powers of stalking are unapproachable. It has been well said of him 

 that although he is " more patient than the Fox, he is less cunning ; 

 less hardy than the Wolf, he leaps better and can resist famine 

 longer. He is not so strong as the Bear, but keeps a better look out 

 and has sharper sight. . . . Every animal he can reach with one 

 of his bounds is lost and devoured ; if he misses he allows the animal 

 to escape, and returns to crouch in his post of observation, without 

 showing his disappointment. He is not voracious, but he loves 

 warm blood, and this habit makes him imprudent. ... If he comes 

 upon a flock of Goats or Sheep, he approaches, dragging his belly 

 along the ground like a Snake, then raises himself with a bound, 

 falls on the back of his victim, breaks its neck, or cuts its carotids 

 with his teeth, and kills it instantly." 



The Canadian Lynx is not a common animal to-day, for its skin 

 has long been sought after, and except in Eastern Quebec and the 

 adjoining forests of Maine and New Brunswick, it is rarely seen 

 south of Lake Superior, but on the Pacific side it traverses well south 

 in the high mountains. 



It spends the Summer in tangled thickets, and it is there that 

 the young are reared and given their early lessons in hunting. By 

 Winter-time the "ill-natured kittens" are able to procure food on 

 their own account, and whilst at times this is difficult to obtain 

 through long, cold nights in Northern forests, when Spring comes 

 round again, bringing in its train hosts of returning birds, the 

 Lynxes find food in plenty, and make ample amends for the 

 lack of provender which was forbidden them during lone Winter 

 days. 



WILD CAT. — In Great Britain Wild Cats, real and so called, 

 are many, but the pure wild animal (Fig. 114) is a rare creature 

 restricted to the north of Scotland. Such a number of domestic 

 Cats are turned from home and become wanderers, and others so 

 frequently evince a desire to hunt, that it is small wonder there are 

 chronicled in the papers captures of so-called Wild Cats south of the 

 land of the thistle. During my own country pilgrimages I have 

 very frequently come across a domestic Cat poaching in some 

 secluded wood or along an unfrequented hedgerow miles from a 

 habitation of any kind, and my gamekeeper friends have shown me 

 numbers of undesirable feline marauders which have been shot or 



