LEOPARD. 
39 i 
dogs, leopards 1 are frequently brought into collision with Indian villagers; and a 
leopard being mobbed in a garden, or field of sugar-cane or standing corn, from 
which he will charge several times, and bite and claw half a dozen before he is 
despatched or makes his escape, is no uncommon occurrence in India. At night 
leopards frequently find their way into goat-folds or calf-pens, climbing over walls 
or the roofs of native huts in their burglarious inroads, and carrying off their prey 
with great boldness and agility. They appear to have a peculiar penchant for 
dogs; and I have known many villages in parts of Mysore where leopards were 
numerous, in which not a dog was tb be found, or perchance but one or two, 
which would be pointed out by their owners as very lucky ones, they having 
LEOPARD ON THE PROWL. 
escaped sometimes from the very clutches of their unceasing foe, whilst their 
companions had successively fallen victims to his stealthy attacks.” 
This partiality of the leopard for dogs seems to be characteristic of the animal 
from one end of India to the other, and there are many instances on record where 
leopards in the hill-stations have swooped down in broad daylight and carried oft' 
pet dogs from before the very eyes of their European masters or mistresses. It is 
but rarely that leopards take to man-eating, but instances do occur, one of which 
came under the notice of the present writer some years ago, when a leopard carried 
off a considerable number of persons from a village in Kashmir. In Africa the 
general habits of the leopard appear to be very much the same as in India, Sir 
Samuel Baker relating how, on one occasion, a dog was carried off from the very 
middle of his camp by one of these marauders. 
In addition to dogs, which can, of course, be obtained only in the neighbour- 
1 In this extract we omit Mr. Sanderson’s use of the word panther whenever he refers to the leopard. 
