was heard Redwood's voice crying aloud--

"Look out thur? By God! I've missed him."

Before we had time to change our attitudes another rifle cracked, and
another voice was heard, crying in answer to Redwood--

"But, by God! I hain't."

"He's hyur," continued the voice; "dead as mutton. Come this a way, an'
yu'll see the beauty."

Ike's voice was recognised, and we all galloped to the spot where it
proceeded from. At his feet lay the body of the panther quite dead.
There was a red spot running blood between the ribs, where Ike's bullet
had penetrated. In trying to escape from the thicket, the cougar had
halted a moment, in a crouching attitude, directly before Ike's face,
and that moment was enough to give the trapper time to glance through
his sights, and send the fatal bullet.

Of course the guide received the congratulations of all, and though he
pretended not to regard the thing in the light of a feat, he knew well
that killing a "painter" was no everyday adventure.

The skin of the animal was stripped off in a trice, and carried to the
waggon. Such a trophy is rarely left in the woods.

The hunter-naturalist performed some farther operations upon the body
for the purpose of examining the contents of the stomach. These
consisted entirely of the half-digested remains of passenger-pigeons, an
enormous quantity of which the beast had devoured during the previous
night--having captured them no doubt upon the trees.

This adventure formed a pleasant theme for conversation during the rest
of our journey, and of course the cougar was the subject. His habits
and history were fully discussed, and the information elicited is given
below.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

THE COUGAR.

The cougar (_Felis concolor_) is the only indigenous long-tailed cat in
America north of the parallel of 30 degrees. The "wild cats" so called,
are lynxes with short tails; and of these there are three distinct
species. But there is only one true representative of the genus Felis,
and that is the animal in question.

This has received many trivial appellations. Among Anglo-American
hunters, it is called the panther--in their _patois_, "painter." In
most parts of South America, as well as in Mexico, it receives the
grandiloquent title of "lion" (_leon_), and in the Peruvian countries is
called the "puma," or "poma." The absence of stripes, such as those of
the tiger--or spots, as upon the leopard--or rosettes, as upon the
jaguar,