CHAPTER XV. 
PANTHERS, AND OUR OTHER FELINES. 
In preceding articles I protested against any wholesale 
denunciation of the native wild beasts of our continent ag 
naturally cowards. It sounds like a sort of imputation upon 
our soil, that it is not strong enough to have grown even 
wild cats, panthers, bears, etc., with the full instincts of 
destructiveness peculiar to their species elsewhere. 
Mr. Audubon and Dr. Bachman, the editors of the new 
work on the Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, 
entirely discredit what they call “the stories” of its boldness 
in attacking larger animals, men or even children. I agree 
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