One morning rather early, F. and his friend K., while lying in their tent on Mount Aboo, were aroused from sleep by the solemn tones of the Kitmutgar, or butler, announcing news, which, as a matter of course, meant game. Out of bed both sprang simultaneously, and soon discovered from the Shikaree that a panther had been somehow entrapped in a neighboring village, and that the natives wished the sahibs (_Anglicé_ gentlemen) to come with their guns and kill it. Clothes being thrown on, and guns prepared without loss of time, out they sallied into the raw air of the morning (it was not yet light,) and followed the native guide. A smart walk of four or five miles across the mountain top brought them to a little village, or collection of huts, clustered upon the edge of a steep bank, which formed one side of a very narrow rocky valley. Here an Indian hubbub of no ordinary character was going on; but as we approached, respect for the sahibs soon silenced it. All was now explained: a fierce and huge panther had for some time been the terror of the village; sheep, goats, calves, and an occasional piccaninny, had been carried off by the remorseless brute. By accident, the door of a goat-house, which contained about 18 goats, had been left open during the previous night, and the owner, hearing an uproar, rose to shut it, and only then discovered that he had also shut in the panther among his defenseless flock: on making this discovery, he lost no time in coming to demand the sahib’s assistance. F. and K. held a council of war, as to the best mode of action: the goat-house was a round wall of rough stones about three feet high, from the top of which a thatched roof rose to a point in the centre, at about six feet in height above the wall-plate; the rude building had no window, and only the one door, which was so low as only to be entered in a stooping or rather crawling position. At first it was resolved to throw open the door, and shoot the brute as he bolted; but this plan was rejected for several reasons: the natives were crowding round on every side, the place was uneven and rocky, and if in his bolt they had the bad luck to miss him, there was a chance of not getting another shot at him; or, if they did, of hitting one of the natives, who would have run in all directions as soon as the panther appeared. At last, F., with more boldness than discretion, decided to try and shoot him from above: the thatch, however, was too old and rotten to bear his weight, and so a “charpoy” or frame of wood, with cords interlaced across it (used as a bedstead), was procured and laid upon the thatch, and upon it mounted F. and an old gray-headed Shikaree of the village, more like a monkey than a man, whose charge it was to open a hole for F. to shoot through; this he accomplished with so much good will, but unfortunately with so little adroitness, that in a second or two the already ragged thatch had a hole close to F.’s head, not only