Here There Is An Immense Tract Of Country With A Peculiar Short Grass In Every Way Adapted For Sheep-Pasturage, And With The Additional Advantage Of Being Nearly Free From Leopards.

Should sheep succeed on an extensive scale the advantage to the farmer and to the colony would be mutual.

The depredations of leopards among cattle are no inconsiderable causes of loss. At Newera Ellia hardly a week passes without some casualty among the stock of different proprietors. Here the leopards are particularly daring, and cases have frequently occurred where they have effected their entrance to a cattle-shed by scratching a hole through the thatched roof. They then commit a wholesale slaughter among sheep and cattle. Sometimes, however, they catch a "Tartar." The native cattle are small, but very active, and the cows are particularly savage when the calf is with them.

About three years ago a leopard took it into his head to try the beefsteaks of a very savage and sharp-horned cow, who with her calf was the property of the blacksmith. It was a dark, rainy night, the blacksmith and his wife were in bed, and the cow and her calf were nestled in the warm straw in the cattle-shed. The door was locked, and all was apparently secure, where the hungry leopard prowled stealthily round the cowhouse, sniffing the prey within. The scent of the leopard at once aroused the keen senses of the cow, made doubly acute by her anxiety for her little charge, and she stood ready for the danger as the leopard, having mounted on the roof, commenced scratching his way through the thatch.

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