A COUGAR ATTACKS CHILDREN 235

more than they do themselves, without letting any part
of it touch the ground.

Like the bear, the cougar has a terrible reputation for
savageness, and there are almost as many tales of their
attacks on human beings as there are about bear, but
though it cannot be denied that there are numbers of
authentic cases of people being injured and occasionally
killed by the latter, there is only one instance known in
which a cougar was proved guilty of such an offence, and
in this particular case it subsequently transpired that the
animal was half-blind and probably nearly dead of
starvation. Otherwise, the two children who were the
victims of the attack would never have lived to tell the
tale. At the time the incident occurred I took a great
deal of trouble to obtain the actual facts of what took
place, and these facts not only verified the story of an
unprovoked attack, but also showed what splendid
courage and fortitude these two children had.

A girl only eleven years old with a boy, who was three
years younger, were on their way to a pasture, about half
a mile away, to get their ponies; each carried a bridle,
When near the pasture they had to pass along a trail
through some timber, when suddenly a cougar appeared
in front of them, not six feet away. The cougar imme-
diately sprang on the girl, knocked her down, luckily face
downwards, and stood on her. The boy then, with
marvellous presence of mind, called to her to lie still,
at the same time telling her he had a plan to help her.
He then climbed on to a big fallen tree which happened
to be lying close by, and from it he jumped right on the
cougar’s back, at the same time striking it with his bridle.
His gallant effort knocked the cougar off his friend, but he
himself was immediately attacked, knocked down, and
mauled. Then the girl, in spite of several severe wounds
she had already received, got up and went to the boy’s
assistance. With her bridle and fists she tried to fight
the beast off; she even put her arm in the beast’s mouth
to prevent it from biting the boy, and at last she actually
cowed it and drove it off. Both children were badly