84 AFRICAN NATURE NOTES chap, iv 



grown it developed a very much finer mane than I 

 believe has ever been seen in a wild lion that has 

 come to maturity in the part of Africa from which 

 it was brought. Similarly, some thirty years ago 

 there was a very fine lion in the Society's Gardens 

 which was brought by Colonel Knox from the 

 Soudan. Colonel Knox took me to the Gardens 

 to see this animal, and pointed out to me the fact 

 that it had developed a far finer mane (extending 

 much farther back over the shoulders and under 

 the belly) than any man had ever seen in a wild 

 lion in the country from which it came. Lion cubs 

 brought to this country from India also grow fine 

 manes, though I do not think that there is any 

 record of a lion ever having been shot in India 

 with anything more than a fairly good mane. The 

 fact that lion cubs captured in any part of Africa 

 or Asia, and brought up in the comparatively cool 

 and damp climate of Western Europe, always — or 

 nearly always — grow fine manes, which usually 

 cover the whole shoulders and often extend all over 

 the under-surface of the body, and the further fact 

 that in the hotter parts of Africa lions always have 

 very scanty manes, but on the high, cold plateaus 

 often develop good, and occasionally very luxuriant 

 manes, appears to me to show that a heavily maned 

 lion is a reversion to an ancient ancestral type, first 

 evolved in Pleistocene times in a cold and inclement 

 climate. 



