PANTHERS IN A GARDEN

Southland Times, Issue 18965, 13 June 1923, Page 15

PANTHERS IN A GARDEN

EXCITING HUNT IN INDIA. Two strange incidents of a similar nature that fortunately did not end in loss of human life arc reported from Bombay and Burma. A dog was carried away from one of the palaces at Nandod, the capital of Rajpipla State, in the early hours of the morning, and at dawn a small portion of its mangled body was found in the palace garden. Soon after this discovery the gardeners. were greatly scared to come across a panther. The Maharaja was informed, and he immediately made up a shooting party with his guests, who included Captains Aird and Byron, of the Governor s staff. The shooting party climbed on to the roofs of summer houses and nurseries in the garden, and a beat was made to drive the beast from its shelter. Eventually a whole family of panthers, consisting of a very big-sized pair and a full-grown cub, turned out, and after a most exciting chase all were accounted for, Captain Byron bagging two and Captain Aird one. This is the first time in history that panthers not only strayed into such a populated place, but took shelter in the palace. A vast crowd, unconscious of the risk to which they were exposing themselves, collected in and around the garden, and made shooting very difficult. A correspondent writes that a leopard was discovered hiding under a house in Mandalay in a crowded quarter of the city. It is over ten years since a leopard penetrated into Mandalay. Fairly common in the thick jungle, which abounds in every part of Burma, they usually confine their operations to the cattle of villagers in the vicinity. A large shouting crowd pelted the leopard with stones and every other sort of missile, and before the cornered animal could charge its assailants, Mr Rees, of the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company, shot it dead. One theory advanced in explanation of the leopard’s appearance in Mandalay is that it crept aboard one of the flotilla’s fuel steamers which tie up alongside the bank at night, and was thus carried to Mandalay. The incident is reminiscent of the feat of a big tigress which some years ago was shot after it had climbed up about a hundred feet of the Shiva Dagon Pagoda at Rangoon.