At first I thought it was an elk's head, which the missing hounds might have run to bay, but on his arrival the worst was soon known.
It was poor Leopold, one of my best dogs.

He was all but dead, with hopeless wounds in his throat and belly.

He had been struck by a leopard within a few yards of Benton's side, and, with his usual pluck, the dog turned upon the leopard in spite of his wounds, when the cowardly brute, seeing the man, turned and fled.
That night Leopold died.

The next morning Bluebeard was so bad that I returned home with him slung in a litter between two men.

Poor fellow! he never lived to reach his comfortable kennel, but died in the litter within a mile of home.