290 
WILD BEASTS AND THEIR WAYS 
CHAP. 
A leopard will frequently attack if it is certain that 
your eyes have met, and it is always advisable, if you 
are unarmed, to pretend to disregard it, at the same 
time that you keep an acute look-out lest it should 
approach you from behind. Wherever I have been 
in Africa, the natives have declared that they had no 
fear of a lion, provided that they were not hunting, 
as it would certainly not attack them unprovoked; but 
that a leopard was never to be trusted, especially 
should it feel that it was discovered. I remember 
an occasion when the dry grass had been fired, and 
a native boy, accompanied by his grown-up brother, 
was busily employed with others in igniting the 
yellow reeds on the opposite bank of a small stream, 
which had checked the advance of the approaching 
flames. Being thirsty and hot, the boy stooped 
down to drink, and he was immediately seized by 
a leopard, which sprang from the high grass. His 
brother, with admirable aim, hurled his spear at the 
leopard while the boy was in its jaws ; the point 
separated the vertebrae of the neck, and the fierce 
brute fell stone dead. The boy was carried to my 
hut, but there was no chance of recovery, as the 
fangs had torn open his chest and injured the lungs; 
these were exposed to view through the cavity be¬ 
tween his ribs. He died during the night. The 
muscular strength of the jaws and neck is very 
marked in all the carnivora, and the skull when 
cleaned is most disappointing, and insignificant if 
compared with the size of a living head. This is 
especially the case with leopards, and it is difficult 
