172 
THE PANTHER. 
ard. “I am glad yon did not say any 
thing about it. How scared the girls would 
have been!” 
a May-be not. All girls a’n’t so easily 
scared as you’d think for,” remarked Jack. 
“No shame to them, either, if they had been; 
for a panther in the woods is no joke. I de¬ 
clare, Sidney, it makes me shudder to think 
how near you might have been to him. 
As likely as not he was right over your 
heads, for they are wonderful creatures to 
hide. Erastus Waterman says they have 
a way of lying down flat and clinging to a 
limb, so that you might look right at one 
and never see him.” 
“He was not very far off, I know,” said 
Sidney. “I can tell you, I felt a little 
queer when we went back: I thought 
he might be after us. So it really was a 
panther! Did they catch him ?” 
“No, nor won't in a hurry. They tracked 
him up the hollow, past the fields, and into 
the swamp,—which is snug quarters enough 
for him. I shouldn’t wonder if there was 
a pair of them; for they almost always go 
in couples. To think of those little girls 
playing about, and such a creature perhaps 
