When eating, they make a loud, champing noise, which when once heard is never forgotten.
The young, which had come out of the nests where we spent the night, did not appear wary; they were about ten inches long, with yellow eyes, and pupil merely a perpendicular slit.

They were all marked with transverse slips of pale green and brown, half an inch broad.

When speared, they bit the weapon savagely, though their teeth were but partially developed, uttering at the same time a sharp bark like that of a whelp when it first begins to use its voice.

I could not ascertain whether the dam devours them, as reported, or whether the ichneumon has the same reputation here as in Egypt.

Probably the Barotse and Bayeiye would not look upon it as a benefactor; they prefer to eat the eggs themselves, and be their own ichneumons.