legs she advanced with ferocious prowls, when the second barrel, though I do not think it took effect, served to frighten her, for turning round she retreated, followed by the cubs.  Some natives then waded through the mud to the Moorman, who was just exhausted, and would have been drowned but that he fell with his head upon a tuft of grass:  the poor man was unable to speak, and for several weeks his intellect seemed confused.  The adventure sufficed to satisfy him that he could not again depend upon a charm to protect him, from bears, though he always insisted that but for its having fallen from his hair where he had fastened it under his turban, the bear would not have ventured to attack him.”]

Leopards[1] are the only formidable members of the tiger race in Ceylon[2], and they are neither very numerous nor very dangerous, as they seldom attack man.  By the Europeans, the Ceylon leopard is erroneously called a cheetah, but the true “cheetah” (felis jubata),’ the hunting leopard of India, does not exist in the island.[3]

[Footnote 1:  Felis pardus, Linn. What is called a leopard, or a cheetah, in Ceylon, is in reality the true panther.]

[Footnote 2:  A belief is prevalent at Trincomalie that a Bengal tiger inhabits the jungle in its vicinity; and the story runs that it escaped from the wreck of a vessel on which it had been embarked for England.  Officers of the Government state positively that they have more than once come on it whilst hunting; and one gentleman of the Royal Engineers, who had seen it, assured me that he could not be mistaken as to its being a tiger of India, and one of the largest description.]

[Footnote 3:  Mr. BAKER, in his Eight Years in Ceylon, has stated that there are two species of leopard in the island, one of which he implies is the Indian cheetah.  But although he specifies discrepancies in size, weight, and marking between the varieties which he has examined, his data are not sufficient to identify any of them with the true felis jubata.]

There is a rare variety of the leopard which has been found in various parts of the island, in which the skin, instead of being spotted, is of a uniform black.[1] Leopards frequent the vicinity of pasture hinds in quest of the deer and other peaceful animals which resort to them; and the villagers often complain of the destruction of their cattle by these formidable marauders.  In relation to them, the natives have a curious but firm conviction that when a bullock is killed by a leopard, and, in expiring, falls so that its right side is undermost, the leopard will not return to devour it.  I have been told by English sportsmen (some of whom share in the popular belief), that sometimes, when they have proposed to watch by the carcase of a bullock recently killed by a leopard, in the hope of shooting the spoiler on his return in search of his prey, the native owner of the slaughtered animal, though earnestly desiring to be avenged, has assured them that it would be in vain, as the beast having fallen on its right side, the leopard not return.