http://www.archive.org/stream/finalnatu ... h_djvu.txt
THE CARACAL LYNX 35
name of Felis caracal (Nov. Comm. Acad. Petrop.
I776). 1 It has long been used in the East to chase
game; the Arabs and Persians employ it to hunt
antelope, peafowl, and demoiselle crane during
the cold weather, the animal being kept hooded
like a cheetah and then turned after its quarry
in the wheat and millet fields. The speed and
strength of the caracal is much greater than
would be expected. In Vigne's day (1842) many
of the Indian princes regularly kept caracal for
coursing. "The speed of the caracal, or Indian
lynx," observes Vigne, "is, if possible, quicker in
proportion than that of the chita." The same
traveller saw a caracal slipped at a grey fox, which
it ran into as a dog would into a rat. As regards
the strength of this lynx, Dr. Charleton relates that
he saw one fall on a hound, which it killed and tore
to pieces, though the dog defended itself to the
utmost.
Many years ago Commandant Loche received a
caracal from M. Rose, officer of the Bureau Arabe at
Biskra, in the Sahara Desert. It was gentle, playful,
and fond of being stroked; it used to lie on the
furniture, and especially on the beds, like a domestic
cat; in cold weather it crept inside the bed! Another
individual was equally tame, but of uncertain temper.
1. The Hunterian M.S. published by Owen contains an account of a
dissection of a "Shargoss ts (probably = siya gush or caracal); and the
Royal College of Surgeons' Museum contains a nearly complete caracal
skeleton, formerly labelled " Bones of a Shargoss " hence, probably, the
same individual as in the MS.
i got this link. It was quit popular in rajsthan and madhya pradesh. A caracal was used to hunt small game birds like patridges, pigeon.