Montour American. (Danville, Pa.) 1866-1920, 1907-05-16
THE AWFUL BIG CATS
They Are the Most Dangerous of
All Wild Animals.
TIGERS MERcILESS DEMONS.
While Easy to Handle and Quick to
Learn, When Aroused They Are
Fiends ncarnate-Panthers, Jasuars
and Leopards Are Treaeherous.

Fiends Observation-Disclosures, Jaeuars
and Leopards Are Treaeherous.
"Of all wild animals writes \. W.
Rolker In Appleton's Magazine, "in.
Guiding the rhinoceros with his fright
full charge and his dreadful horn, In
Guiding the rogue elephant with his
unbounded strength, his marvellous
cunning and his villainous trunk, and
including that gray shaggy rogue, the
American grizzly, with his rib crush
ing hug, his ponderous paw and his
hot, reeking nav, no beast is as dan
gerous TO man as any one of the big
cats.
For, besides the mouth provided
with teeth that can crunch through the
leg bone of a man as if 1t were a
pipestem, each foot is provided with
five poniard-like claws, pointed like
needles and from three to four and
half inches long. AS the beast strikes
with these he draws the claws in,
keeping hold of muscles and tendons
and llgaments and tearing them out of
the flesh until they snap like rubber
bands. so that unless the victim sue
cumbs it will be months and months
and sometimes years and years be-
fore he can regain use of an injured
member
But not only do these talonS tear
viciously. Curious to say, although
the claws are needle pointed and
the edges are dull as the tip of little
finger, cut with one of these hooks
is like the cut of a dagger. On one oc-
casion in Bostocks trained wild ami
NAL show Bengal tigress made II
sweep at European black bear. cut
through the six inch thick fur of the
bear and cut three parallel strips two
feet long and six inches deep and
clean as razor slashes to the very
backbone of the beast.
"As matter of fact. the dexterlty
of one of these big cats claws is as
founding Here is a curious accident
undertook personally to break in a
rogue tiger that had gone bad Pro-
vided with sole leather guards worn
next the skin and covering the fieshy
part of the leg from the groin To the
knee. he entered the arena with The
bad one and was attacked and wound
ed. His trousers were slashed In one
spot just big enough to admit a single
claw, an undergarment showed two
similar and the sole leather guard
three similar cuts, while the flesh was
torn an inch deep in four places three
inches long
"Still another instance showing the
marvellous quickness of claw happened
in the same show when the trainer in
charge of a leopard group was saved
in the nick of time from n rogue which
had tried to pull him down by climb
ing up on him. The arm of this man
showed between wrist and elbow alone
twenty-six wounds varying from
quarter of an inch deep and an inch
long to one inch deep and four inches
long
"Of all the big cats, including that
magnificent jungle named monarch of
might, the lion, and including those
beautifully spotted orange and black
villains, the jaguar and the leopard,
and their cousin. that noiseess, light
ming swift traitor. the panther. train
ers prefer to handle the tiger.
This is contrary to the popular be-
lief which credits the tiger as the most
bloodthirsty of all wild beasts. The
tiger is however, the quickest to learn
and the easiest TO handle. Whereas
the tiger always remains Il nervous,
high strung brute, after a time lion
becomes phlegmatic and lazy and re-
quires urging. which is apt to cause
trouble
"Whereas the tiger is n demon incar-
nate and merciless once aroused, he is
at least an honest fighter that gives
ample warning when about to attack
and only rs rare exception attacks
man from behind unlike the jaguar,
the leopard and the panther, which are
rreacherous and almost invariably at
tack when a back is turned.
again, of all this dangerous family
the nature of the tiger comes nearest
that of any ordinary house cat, and, al
ways comparatively, the tiger it is that
IS most appreciative once the master
has succeeded in establishing his truce.
Then, like the domestic cat, he likes to
brush up against the person of his
trainer, loves to have his back rubbed
and groomed and the top of his head
scratched to Soothe the everlasting itch
between the ears, while he emits purs
Of satisfaction, forgetting that the
least Unforeseen accident may arouse
murderous instincts that would in q
twinkling convert the friendly meeting