The African leopard is an audacious animal, although it is ungrateful of me to say a word against him, after the way he has let me off personally... taken as a whole, he is the most lovely animal I have ever seen; only seeing him, in the one way you can gain a full idea of his beauty, namely in his native forest, is not an unmixed joy to a person, like myself, of a nervous disposition.

Travels in West Africa: Congo Francais, Corisco and Cameroons (ed. 1898)