Caesar: The Life Story of a Panda-Leopard

by Patrick O'Brian

  But at last morning came, with one of the most beautiful sunrises that I have ever seen.

  Then presently my master woke up, and after harnessing the horse, he set off towards the place where we had left the boar. After taking my chain off, and telling me to have a good sleep, he shut me in the hut.

  I heard the noise of the horse die away in the distance and then I went to sleep. Hardly had I closed my eyes, however, when I was awakened by a soft hiss, and starting up I saw a large sized python surveying me with glittering eyes.

  I jumped up, and either my eyes were deceiving me or something, for between me and the terrible snake I clearly saw my mother. She looked pale and smoky, but perhaps that was the sleep in my eyes, and I thought I saw her baring her teeth in a snarl at the snake.

  The snake glided out of the door, which was slightly ajar.

  Then the thought that perhaps she had lived through the fire flashed through my mind, and I started forward with a purr of delight to meet her, but to my horror and amazement there was nothing there. I had gone right through her.

  Turning round — I thought perhaps she was hiding, but after searching the hut I was convinced that I must have imagined the whole thing, in a sort of waking dream. But there were still the snake marks in the dust on the floor to explain away, but not the faintest scent of her or a footmark except my own was in the hut.

  Greatly puzzled by this incident, I walked up and down trying to solve the mystery, but then almost at once my master came in, with the body of the boar, which he had fetched with the horse.

  I suppose he put down my agitation to my wound.

  As the cut was practically closed, we set off for the house, and going rather slowly we reached it by midday.

  When I was going to my cage I trod on a sharp flint, which opened the cut again, so feeling rather angry and upset I let my master bind it up again, but I soon worried the bandage off as I was feeling rather peevish.

  Until nightfall I wondered how to explain the fact that the snake had not appeared at all alarmed at my mother’s presence.

  All my explanations to myself that it was a dream were swept away by the fact that the snake marks were so obvious that there was no mistaking them.

  As I was unable to come to any satisfactory conclusion, I dismissed the matter entirely from my mind and went to sleep.

  Early next morning I was awakened by my master calling to me from outside the cage, and he was carrying what seemed like the shoulder of the boar, which he gave to me. After I had consumed it he came into the cage and inspected my paw, which was healing nicely.

  After this I went out into the paddock while he cleaned my cage. My master did not take me out again for nearly two weeks, during which time my paw had quite healed and I was feeling very fit.

  Then one day a lot of white men came and looked at me. My master was with them, and he brought one old white man into my cage. I was feeling very happy and good-humoured, so after the stranger had got over his first fears I permitted him to stroke my head, very nervously, with the tips of his fingers, standing as far off as possible, while my master was encouraging him. I looked round and caught my master’s eye. He smiled and nodded and our amusement was mutual.

  Soon the little man became rather boring, and as I wanted to play with my master, I decided to get rid of him, so suddenly springing up I gave a frightful snarl, showing all my teeth, and he left quite hurriedly.

  After he had gone my master burst into a roar of laughter, and after producing the chain, we went to the garden, where he told me to stay while he harnessed the horse.

  I had just jumped up into the lower branches of a tree which was in the corner of the garden, so as to be in the shade, when I heard the voice of our visitor raised in a somewhat agitated manner. Evidently he was walking down the gravel path outside which led to the garden gate.

  Then I heard it open, and into the garden walked my mistress and the old man, who was saying, ‘I tell you the beast is not safe. It will be escaping some day and eating somebody.’

  Then I jumped down from the tree to meet my mistress, who always made a fuss of me. The old man let out a bellow like a bull buffalo in pain and disappeared with remarkable speed, leaving a cloud of dust.

  My mistress appeared a little flustered at first by her guest’s curious behaviour, but just then my master reappeared, and they talked together, and then they both laughed, and my master and I went to the horse, which was getting impatient, and then we went out on to the plain.

  This time, however, luck seemed to have deserted us, for in a whole day we sighted only one antelope, and I bungled the stalking of it so badly that it was able to get down-wind of me, and it was off at once.

  I thought that I could run it down and set off after it, but I failed dismally, and after I had gone nearly a mile at top speed, and in the end had lost it, I turned and went back to my master, who consoled me with a large piece of the meat which he was eating from a bag.

  It had an extraordinary taste, rather interesting, but like no animal that I had ever killed, and there was no blood in it at all. I afterwards found out that men have a curious way of putting their meat over a fire and destroying its delightful original flavour by many quaint devices. Why they did this I could never discover.

  Then after the midday siesta we searched for game and followed up many trails but with no success. At last we heard a frightful noise coming from behind a small hill about half a mile distant.

  We reached it in a few minutes. Meanwhile the extraordinary noises increased in volume. They mystified and frightened me, and I was wondering what strange beast this might be which howled so horribly, when suddenly we came upon a white man squatting in front of a box which gave out these terrible roars and whines. The beast was evidently imprisoned within it.

  The man was not in the least disconcerted by our sudden appearance and continued to belch out smoke from his mouth at intervals. Then he said to my master in a curious kind of voice: ‘Say Bo — taking the cat out for a run?’

  My master laughed and they talked for a little while.

  Then he tethered the horse, and together they went over to a kind of cart which was standing about twenty feet away.

  Up to this time I had been so utterly petrified with amazement that I had stood perfectly still by the horse, but then the animal in the box gave a particularly violent and high-pitched howl which hurt my ears, so I roared at it to silence it.

  My master laughed and then said to the man: ‘I’m afraid Cæsar has no ear for radio music.’

  Then the stranger came over to the box and either killed the beast within it or something.

  Then my master and the stranger began to do something to the cart. At first I thought that the man had lost the bullock for his cart, but when it suddenly gave out a menacing roar I altered my opinion and roared back at it, thoroughly frightening the horse, who plunged and kicked till my master came over and calmed him.

  Fifteen

  For the next months we did a lot of hunting with various success, mostly the smaller antelopes, who sometimes came quite near the house.

  Once I killed a small Nilgai or blue bull, after a struggle in which I got rather nastily gored, but my master intervened and shot the creature with his revolver.

  During this time I saw quite a lot of his children. They grew rapidly, and I liked them almost as if they were my own cubs. But one day I missed them, all except the smallest, and then I remembered having seen them start on a journey.

  My master seemed rather silent and sad after they had gone, and when my mistress and the youngest went a week after he became quite melancholy, and spent most of his time with the horse and with me, sometimes going great distances up to the mountains, where I caught some fine ibex and bharals and we saw some red pandas.

  My master always appeared very surprised at the way I could follow even the fastest in this very rocky and dangerous country, but I thought it was scarcely surprising. Most of my food during my life had been de
rived from mountain goats and wild sheep, so that I was adept at hunting them.

  Speaking of red pandas, I have seen many more of them than of my own type, which is so much larger than they are.

  Besides, who would have a silly red coat instead of a clean white one, with such fine black ears?

  My indignation was great when my master caught and tried to tame a nasty smelly red panda, spending quite a lot of time with it instead of with me.

  However, one day it poked its head through the bars and made foolish noises at me, trying to make friends, no doubt. But, to punish its impudence, I bit its head right off, and so stopped its idiotic chauntering.

  My master was very angry and took no notice of me for three days, but I had the satisfaction of knowing that he could no longer like the red panda.

  As I have said, my mother was a very large snow-leopard, and this accounts for the fact that I was growing so very large. Also, my legs, unlike those of most great pandas, were growing quite long, and I could run very fast.

  About this time the spring was coming on and my summer coat was growing. I noticed a lot of blackish spots on my new fur which I thought greatly enhanced my appearance.

  A week after I killed the red panda my master took me out hunting again. This time we went on for four days right up to the foothills of the great range of mountains, which I had seen from my cave and which was about eighty miles to the west.

  After we had stayed there for two days, hunting sha and bharal, we ascended half-way up the nearest of the mountains. It was hardly a mountain, but really only a large foothill, being the top of a long ridge, which extended right and left, before we came to the real heights. We left the horse tethered near the tent in which my master always slept.

  On reaching that part of the mountain where the snow always lay I killed an ibex, which my master skinned and cut up, putting the very best pieces into his knapsack and giving me the rest. Then we went still higher up, and I noticed my master was breathing with difficulty. So we stopped, and after looking all round at the vast extent of land below us, we began to descend. I stayed behind, finishing the last pieces of the ibex, and after a few minutes my master turned and called me.

  He did not appear to be able to see me until I moved, and for the first time I saw the use of my white coat, which made me quite invisible against the snow. After about two hours we reached the horse, which was feeding on some of the scanty grass which was the vegetation. He was pleased to see us, and, as he had broken his rope, he trotted up to my master, who patted his neck, and I felt rather jealous but did not show it.

  When night fell my master made a fire and cooked the pieces of ibex in a pot full of melted snow.

  Then next morning he put the tent down and we all ascended the mountain side. The horse was a lot of trouble, but at last we got about half-way up. He put the tent up again behind a huge boulder where there was no snow. It was hard for him to fix the tent pegs, but at last he found a patch of ground with a little grass on it.

  Soon he had a fire on the bare rock, where he cooked some more of the ibex, some of which he gave to me.

  Later in the day he shot a goat (which I had missed) which had darted up a pinnacle of rock. This was the most remarkable piece of rock which I had ever seen, jutting straight out into the air over a precipice of about two thousand feet. The goat, on being shot, bounded into the air and luckily fell our side of the precipice.

  As the cold was intense my master made a coat from the skin of this goat and the ibex, which he wore with the fur inside. At the time I remember I thought human skin must be very poor protection against the cold.

  On the next day, as I was following a very large goat up a sharp incline towards the peak, it suddenly disappeared from view behind a rock. In a few minutes I had reached the place, but the goat was nowhere to be seen. Then I observed a narrow fissure in the mountain side through which it must have gone. I thought I had him now for certain, as in his terror he had fled into a blind alley.

  This was not so, however, for on investigation the fissure proved to lead into a roughly circular tunnel, down which I could dimly see the goat.

  Its hoof-beats echoed and re-echoed till it sounded like twenty goats. I followed it for some way, but it seemed to know the twists and turns of the tunnel, and after turning a corner, before I had time to see where I was going, it darted off into a side turning leading off the main one.

  I ran on for some little way and passed several tunnels which led off the one I was following. I think I passed five before I came to a place where the main passage split into four. Rapidly selecting one, I darted down it and charged full tilt into a very chilly and deep stream. Scrambling out I pursued my course until I realised that the goat must have escaped me.

  I began to retrace my steps, and after crossing the stream I came to the place where the tunnels converged, and I wondered which one I had come by. I chose one, of course the wrong one, but I followed it until I saw a glint of light at the end.

  Soon I emerged, but instead of finding myself on the familiar ground about half a mile from the tent, I was standing on the top of a pleasant grassy slope going down with a gentle incline to a small lake, fed by the stream into which I had fallen, which gurgled out into a little waterfall to my left.

  About ten miles across this valley the real mountains extended in a vast unbroken line as far as I could see.

  Then I understood that I must have gone right through the mountain, which was no doubt honeycombed by these tunnels. The idea came to me that if I could get back I could lead my master through by this way and save him the painful and slow ascent of the mountain, as he obviously intended to get over to this side.

  So, turning, I went back by the path I had come, and I noticed that all the way it sloped upwards, which accounted for the lowness of the far end of the tunnel. As I went I thought it would be a good thing to follow my own tracks backwards and thus find a way out. The rock held the scent very badly, and as I was very used to my own smell I had a lot of trouble in following it.

  Presently I came to a place where the paths met, and as I was determined not to go wrong again, I carefully noted all the distinguishing marks of the passage along which I had just come.

  Then I cast around for my tracks again, and after finding them I wondered if these might be the ones that led to the stream or not. However, I took the chance, and following them up, I soon discovered that I was wrong again, and I felt quite lost.

  Sixteen

  After wandering round and round the seemingly endless series of galleries and caves, and several times recrossing my tracks, quite suddenly I found myself at the entrance again.

  The time was late afternoon, but I noticed that the sky was dark and I could not see the tent in the gloom which surrounded me.

  I began to trot down to where I thought the tent would be about half a mile further, and as I went the sky became darker and I grew alarmed, for though I had been wandering for a long time in the tunnel, it was not nearly night time yet.

  Then suddenly the wind rose, and a few flakes of snow fell in my face, and then all at once down came the snow. The wind blew a flurry of snow into my eyes and I was temporarily blinded, so brushing my paw over my face I pushed on.

  I could hardly see a yard ahead, and the wind which was blowing into my face howled like an angry wolf, carrying away the sounds which I made to attract my master.

  As I had twisted and turned so much in the tunnels I had quite lost my sense of direction which was usually so infallible, so after about twenty minutes struggling with the wind, I found myself at the brink of the precipice, still further from my master.

  By now the wind had reached a terrible force, and for a little while it was all I could do to prevent myself from being blown over the edge.

  Presently it abated a little, and I soon gained the shelter of a protecting boulder, and I sat down under the lee of it. The wind, however, returned with still greater force and the snow utterly shut out all the light, s
o I stayed behind the rock, but a powerful eddy of air kept covering me with snow, and if I had not been continually shaking it off I would have been buried in a very short time.

  At length the day must have merged into night, but I noticed no difference, either in the light or in the fury of the storm.

  Soon the snow heaped up in a huge drift on the other side of the rock, and at what I would judge to be about the middle of the night, the great drift became over tall and a small avalanche entirely buried me. I was almost suffocated before I had time to scramble out, and on doing so the wind raised me up into the air in spite of all my efforts to keep on my feet.

  After carrying me a little way the wind dropped me into another snowdrift which had heaped up on the windward side of an even larger boulder. I burrowed through the snow to the other side, which was somewhat hollowed out like a shallow cave and gave excellent shelter.

  The place seemed very familiar, and I wondered where I had seen it before — when suddenly I remembered this was the place where the tent had been, and looking round I saw the marks made by the tent pegs. I searched for the remains of a fire, but it was outside the little semi-circle of protection and was buried.

  It was evident that my master had gone without me, but where, I wondered, had he gone — up the mountain? If so it was unlikely that he would survive such a storm. If he had gone down the mountain, sheltering among the smaller foothills, he might have lived through it; but then it would be impossible for me to find him. I thought of going back to the house if the storm ever finished, which seemed hardly likely.

  It must have been nearly a hundred miles either south or west to my master’s house. I tried to recall our route on coming up to the mountains, and all the different ways which we had gone in four days, sometimes going on trail after game, and more than once making detours round lakes, but it was too much for my memory. After striving to collect my thoughts and failing, my senses left me and I sank into a sleep of utter exhaustion.

  I did not wake up until the middle of the next day. The storm had ceased, and I started up with the intention of joining my master at once, but to my horror there was no track or traces for me to follow, for of course the snow had obliterated all of them for miles.