Martinsburg Gazette And Public Advertiser

A British traveller in Brazil gives the following account of a Panther hunt near the Villa de Fernaiba.

"Finding I still persisted in my favorite pursuit, the Governor good-naturedly resolved on gratifying me with the spectacle of a panther hunt. Accompanied by his sons, we rode out early in the morning to an extensive plain, in the centre of which was a jungle; into this the Vaqueiros had succeeded in driving, on the previous night, a large panther, preparatory to the morning's sport. We took our station on an eminence which commanded a view of the entire field. The loud barking of the dogs, the wild cries of the huntsmen as they galloped round the skirts of the jungle cheering on the dogs, formed an animated scene. Aroused in his lair, the panther, furious with rage, spring forth to meet its enemies. The Vaqueiro nearest to the point from which it had issued, now advanced to the attack. He exhibited a beautiful sight, whirling in the air his lasso, and urging forward with the spur the spirited little steed on which he was mounted, whose dilated nostrils, fiery eye-ball, and erect mane, proclaimed his instinctive dread of the enemy in his front. The panther crouched in the act of springing on his advancing foe, but he was forestalled by the well-skilled assailant, who, at the distance of twenty yards, threw his lasso with unerring aim.—Scarcely had it left his hand before the well-trained horse wheeled round and flew across the plain, dragging after him the already disabled panther; for with such beautiful precision had the lasso been thrown, that the fore paw of the animal was fairly strapped to his neck. The whole party now dashed forward to be in at the death. The Vaqueiro, slackening his pace, gradually shortened the length of the cord till he brought his enemy within a few yards of him, and then, in less time than I can narrate it, I saw him leap from his saddle, his broad knife gleaming in the morning sunbeam, and, with the rapidity of lightning leaving the cloud, it was buried in the heart of the panther."