“I feeled that it war time to stop the steam, an’ take in sail; so clutchin’ holt o’ a branch, I brought the baldies to anchor. I war all out o’ breath, and it war some time afore I ked rekiver my legs, and release myself from my feathered kumpanyuns. I tuk good care not to let them go; though sartintly I owed them thet much for the sarvice they had done me, but jess then I bethort me o’ the Britisher at Grand Gulf—ah! you it war, ye say, young feller?”
“Certainly. And those are the eagles I purchased from Mrs Stump?”
“Them same birds, strenger. You shed a hed the young ’uns, but thar warn’t no chance ever ag’in to clomb thet cyprus, an’ what bekim o’ the poor critters arterward, I haint the most distant idee. I reckin they ended thar days in the neest, which ye still see up thar; an’ ef they did, I reckin the buzzarts wudn’t be long in makin’ a meal o’ ’em.”
With my eyes directed to the top of the tall cypress, and fixed upon a dark mass, resembling a stack of faggots, I listened to the concluding words of this queer chapter of “Backwoods Adventure.”
Story 7.
The Black Jaguar—An Adventure on the Amazon.
It has been a contested point among naturalists, whether the black jaguar of America is merely a variety of the felis onca, or a distinct species. The best informed writers regard it in the former light; and, so far as my observation has extended, I can perceive no essential difference between the two varieties, either in size, shape, or habits. They appear to be distinguished by colour alone.
Every one knows the colour of the common jaguar—a glossy yellowish ground, turning paler, almost whitish, under the belly and throat, and mottled all over by what appear to be jet black spots, but which, on closer inspection, turn out to be irregular rings, each with a black blotch in the centre, forming a species of marking which may very properly be termed a rosette. It is this central spot of the ring that chiefly distinguishes the markings of the jaguar from those of the leopard and panther of the Old World—these having the ring, but not the dab in the centre.