English Dictionary

Sometimes there is confusion over the heraldic leopard, the question being—When is a leopard not a leopard? There is a theory that the lion and leopard were the same thing, and that they were named entirely depending on their attitude—thus if the animal was passant guardant it was a leopard, but when rampant it was a lion. Nowadays a leopard is the genuine spotted article and quite unmistakeable. Some people still speak, wrongly, of the leopards of England, but it does no great harm as it is an ancient expression and everybody knows what it means.