My father knew a man whose wife kept a leopard. Her husband had been given it by a Sashan diplomat. It’s a very special, prestigious gift in Sashan society. The idea is, you turn it loose in your deer park, chase it with hounds and kill it, preferably on foot with a sword. Barbaric, said his wife, we’re not doing that, and I guess her husband, who’d have had to take care of the on-foot-with-a-sword side of things, didn’t give her much of an argument. Instead, she tamed the horrible thing. It was just like a big pussycat. It curled up in a basket and slept a lot. It held still while she tied
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