The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1894-09-17

position. I had occupied the night before.
fastened TO my picket a new goat, for
and was soon sitting in eDT % tb bGgnf pbr 1
ing my KID. About once in fifteen minutes;
] made him bleat by pinching his neck or
his ears, at the same time holding him W
above my head SO that he might be heard
at the greater distance; but this / did
only at the intervals when the moon was
not hidden by clouds.
The moon had been darkened for a
moment by a heavy cloud. when / heard
body fail on my goat with such a shock
as would be made by the tumble of a
horse thrown from a third story of a
building. The goat gave a stifled cry. /
could see a black, confused mass but
could distinguish nothing clearly. 1 shut
ard opered my eyes several times to &C
custom myself to the darkness, but I
could not see clearly enough to send bull
let with precision. / noiselessly withdrew
one of my balls, which 1 replaced with a
cartridge of twenty-four large mould shot
With a charge like this 1 had demol-
ished more than one wild boar. In my
second barrel l had steel-pointed ball.
A diamond which served for a bead at
the tip of my rife shone brightly enough
in the light Of a few stars. I glanced
II the cloud was likely TO last still longer;
1t was too large for me to wait for it to
pass. With my loss of the night before
still in my mind, l was unwilling to eX-
pose myself to a fresh miSadyenture.
took aim at the black mass and pulled the
trigger.
u.
not a sight, not the slightest movement.
j rubbed my eyes. asking if l had been
the victim of an error. and had fired on
the bank after all ! waited a few min
utes, an6 then, with my rifle on my
shoulder and my hunting knife between
my teeth. / set out to reconnoiter.
A DEATHLY EMBRACE.
Coming within a yard of the object
at which ] had fired. it was quite a. sur
prise to see a panther-for it was a VERT
able panther. and a fine one-lying
stretched out in a beautiful position,
posture was so natural that, not knowing
but he Was alive and still in the act of
oevouring his prey, ! put the end of my
brutally Still receiving no response, /
put my knife back into its sheath and
tried to roll the beast over by pulling its
fail: but ii seemed he was inSeparably
fastened to the goat / touched the hands
of my watch to learn the time: il was a
quarter before midnight. could not re-
frain from speaking aloud: What glor-
ious luck. to shoot in the most abso-
lute darkness and succeed like this,'
] tied my kid to the picket and went
back 10 TIE bushes.
The little kid. sensible of the panther's
presence, cried so much and SO loudly ali
the rest of the night that he brought to-
gether a regiment of jackals. But i did
not need to take the pains to put them
to flight: they kept at distance con-
tenting themselves with plaintive howl
ing
Day came at last and ] could see the
panther holding in its enormous jaws my
goat. crushed as thin as board. |
turned the goat over on her side and
opened her belly to observe the position
of the panther's claws which were locked
in the creatures heart and lungs. The
poor thing had three ribs broken, be-
sides. and her skull looked as if it had
bsen crushed by hammer. IT was easy
to understand why she had made no
complaint but the death-rattle.
] wished to make sure of the direction
from which the panther had come to en-
abb him TO arrive thus suddenly. The
goat had been placed on the bank formed
back from the edge of the latter. l
drew q semi-circle around the goat, en-
Iarging il gradually. l found nothing.
Iakdar, whom / had sent to the other
(thicket, two yards from that edge.
We were able to ascertain from UNI
seal signs that the panther had
SsGnded from this point. Now, the ra-
animal, then, 4 made leap of thirteen
yards and that explained the prodigious
noise that ] had heard.
The panther. of medium size, had been
-antly killed by "a shot that had en-
tered the eye and pierced the brain, by
a second one entering the ear and third
which pierced the heart, ana seven others
in the neck and other parts of the body.
A SECOND CONQUEST.
On the 18th of November I left Algiers
by carriage, and Oh the same day at
o'clock in the evening arrived at the
Moorish cafe of Bab-Ali. The Arabs
wished me to sleep in the settlement. But
the weather being clear, was anxious to
set out at once, for fear OF losing night
which promised to be lair
/ asked for a goat. took care to muzZle
st. and with a half dozen. Arabs ] entered
the wood. We first followed the narrow