THE BIG GAME OF AFRICA 



very fast for any length of time. For a few dozen paces 

 they go with great speed and in long leaps, but then their 

 wind seems suddenly to give out, and they fall into a heavy 

 gallop, or canter, when an ordinary riding pony will soon 

 outdistance them. 



One of the most interesting and at the same time sure 

 ways of hunting lions is to have a man gallop after them 

 on horseback until the lion, unable to escape any longer, 

 suddenly stops and turns on its pursuer, giving the sports- 

 man an excellent chance to shoot his trophy at close quar- 

 ters. On one of the first days of my sojourn on the Sotik 

 and Loita plains I had two very interesting lion hunts 

 in this way, the account of which I here copy from my 

 diary : 



". . . After marching with the whole caravan for about 

 five hours this morning, we came up to a rather high point 

 in the plains, where we rested for a few moments, and 

 where I looked around with my field glasses to see if I 

 could detect something that looked like a watering place, 

 for it was now evident that our Masai guide had not told us 

 the truth about the distance to the nearest water. With 

 the glasses I now plainly saw three lions a little to our left 

 and about a thousand yards oflf. One looked unusually 

 large and had a very black mane, while the two others 

 seemed to be either young males or possibly a maneless 

 male and a female. I was very anxious to bag one of these 

 lions, particularly as they lay right in the line of our 

 march, so I dispatched my brave ' lion chaser,' Asgar, to 

 gallop away with the hunting pony to hinder the biggest 

 lion from running away, until we could come up. 



" Now followed the most exciting and interesting chase 



36 



