Winter Fauna of Mount Marcy. 



15 



the Felis concolor of naturalists. This animal, the painter 

 of the guides, the largest and most powerful of our Felidse, 

 is entirely carnivorous — an Ishmaelite among beasts. Im- 

 mensely muscular, it is yet more remarkable for agility 

 and swiftness of movement, and finds no difficulty in pro- 

 viding itself with game food. In the notch between Mt. 

 Marcy and Mt. Skylight one of the guides came upon large 

 foot prints in partially thawed snow, and following them 

 up the slopes of Mt. Marcy, through the dense, low tim- 

 ber, now ascending steeps, now traveling along snowy 

 ridges, found in several places clear and unmistakable 

 impressions, large, massive footprints of this mountain lion. 



To myself the trail of this animal was far from unex- 

 pected. For years I had, summer after summer, remarked 

 indications of their presence along the Opalescent river 

 valley, an*d on the neighboring mountains, and less mark- 

 edly, in the Panther gorge, once its undisturbed resort 

 and home, for the chat de montagne^ is here, as in Canada and 

 the west, found true to its name, rendering it, veritably, 

 the cat of the mountain. It is with regret that I must re- 

 cord that in the present instance his trail appeared to indi- 

 cate that he was in the ignoble pursuit of rabbits ! This 

 could not be owing to necessity either, for deer in plenty 

 were to be had in the valleys to the southward, and from 

 indications observed during the summer, were not only 

 frequently destroyed by panthers, but devoured with more 

 haste than delicacy — flesh, hair, entrails and skin being 

 greedily eaten together. It may be here remarked that 

 in accordance with the opinion of some of the guides, the 

 panther, like others of our wild animals, is quite local in 

 its habitation, the guides telling of one having a large and 

 well marked footprint, which for four or five years has 

 resided upon a small mountain homestead of about twenty- 

 five square miles, always returning after his occasional 

 progresses to his more distant dominions. These long di- 

 rect journeys are also a strongly marked peculiarity of the 



