can give a big bound like a cat,
and as he also has padded feet, he can catch his prey by stalking it. He
creeps silently through the jungle, till he comes near his prey; then he
gives a sudden bound and falls upon it.

The leopard has splendid muscles; the muscles are not big, but they are
hard. The leopard leads such an active life that he is generally slim,
without any flabbiness. In fact, the leopard is a perfect type of feline
grace, beauty, and agility. The lion is the laziest animal of the Cat
Tribe; the leopard is the most active. The leopard is even more active
than the tiger.

_The Panther: Popular Name for Large Leopard_

There is no such animal as the _panther_. That is only the popular name
for a large leopard--particularly a large and ferocious leopard.

Some people fear a large leopard even more than they do a tiger, because
a large leopard attacks a man even more often than a tiger does. Other
wild animals as a rule avoid man, as I have told you before. But a tiger
very often attacks man, and a large leopard does so almost every time he
can. He is by nature even more ferocious than a tiger.

The leopard has this very bad quality: he is perhaps the only animal
that kills for the mere "fun" of killing--just like some men who call
themselves "sportsmen." If a large leopard gets among a herd of cattle,
he kills several of them, one after another. He does the same with wild
pigs, wild goats, and wild sheep. He kills many more than he can
possibly eat. In fact, the bad name some people give to the tiger in
that respect really belongs to the panther or large leopard. When a
large number of animals are found killed, a tiger is usually blamed for
it.

But wise people, who have studied the ways of animals, never make that
mistake. Of course, they cannot always tell by the paw marks on the
ground whether a small tiger or a large leopard did the killing--because
the paw marks of a large leopard look so much like those of a small
tiger. But if a single one of the animals killed has been eaten, then
they know whether it was a tiger or a leopard that did the killing. How
do they know that? By examining the part eaten--as I have already
described to you on page 178.

_How the Leopard Seizes his Prey_

A leopard usually seizes his prey by the throat. He grips the throat in
his jaws, and holds on till the animal cannot breathe and is suffocated.

If the prey is large, such as a big stag, the leopard's grip