In North America, Catamount is a name applied to the cougar or the lynx.
Although the Hazlitt Diary, describing the appearance of one on Cape Cod, says: “It was said to be five feet long; besides, the tail was as much more; and it could mount trees, whence its name,” the name is actually formed by contraction from “cat of the mountain,” because the critters are usually to be found in hilly country , or, at least, the critters of the cat family known to the English by this name, the leopard or the panther, frequent such regions.
