4§ TRAVELS IN 
companion, who was looking for me. As it 
was now night, I had no defire to rejoin him^ 
and I fufFered him to fire away at his plea- 
fure; he however arrived, but very late. His 
furprife at feeing me perfedly fafe and 
found, was equal to his joy; for he con- 
feffed that, from the manner in which my 
dog barked, he judged I was engaged with an 
hyrEna, or a tyger ; and that, not hearing me 
return an anfwer when he fired his mufket, 
he believed that I was torn to pieces. This 
adventure, which I related to him with all its 
particulars, made us both laugh heartily ; but 
what he told me refpeding the courfe I ought 
to have purfued in this rencontre, made me re- 
gret much that I did not fire upon the animal. 
Being as yet a novice in the country of thefe 
ferocious beafts, this was the firft I had ever 
beheld fo near, and I was altogether ignorant 
how to proceed with a panther. In this 
manner did I amufe my leifure hours, and 
prepare myfelf infenfibly for greater dan- 
gers. 
We often went to the Ifle of Schaapen, to 
kill rabbits. In one of thefe excurfions, which 
had before afforded us much pleafure, we had 
a very 
