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210 given the puma a character for ferocity in works of natural history which its appearance in a cage would hardly justify, for its comfortable fur and sleek limbs might be thought to belong to a gentler creature.

The leopard and panther are to the east what the jaguar and puma are to the west; and their lives, whether we consider the kindliness of Nature to them or their strange immunity from harm, are equally to be envied. They live, it is true, within the empire of the tiger, but only, as in the days of the Heptarchy, the Mercian or the Northumbrian prince would have called himself within the realm of the Bretwalda; or as, in the early days of France, the dukes of Soissons or of Burgundy were subject to Paris; or, earlier still, only as Acarnania or Locris confessed the hegemony of Sparta. There is respect on both sides, and therefore a large measure of peace within the earldoms and duchies of the big cats.

The domesticated cat is an animal that can be best approached sideways. Direct description, that is to say, does not bring out its peculiarities quite so well as the oblique form, which throws slanting lights upon the subject. To illustrate my meaning, let us take that frivolous proposition of the French to impose a tax upon cats; and following it out, note how the character of the animal develops itself by incidence.

How the tax is to be collected no senator ventured to explain, and when the project comes to the touchstone of practice we may confidently expect it to fall through. For the difficulties in the way of the collection of such a tax are immense. It is true they are not all on the surface, and so the impost may at the first glance pass as