THE LION 169 



Lions do not go into heavy forests, although they make 

 their day lairs along the edges. They like to lie up for the 

 day in patches of jungle which border on open plains; in 

 bushes in open scrub; in clumps of reeds; in any thick bit 

 of cover in the open thorn forests which are so plentiful in 

 much of the game country; and perhaps especially in a 

 strip of cover along a river, or one of the dense masses of 

 brush and trees, of small extent, which are found along 

 the watercourses. They also lie in tall grass. Occasionally 

 they lie, throughout the day, right out in the open, on a 

 mound or the side of an ant-hill, or under a low bush or tree 

 that does not shield them from sight. If the grass is very 

 tall they find it easy to get close to their prey and to evade 

 human observation; and where the brush is thick or the 

 open forest fairly continuous it is almost a chance if one 

 comes on them. If much molested they become strictly 

 nocturnal; otherwise, under more natural conditions, al- 

 though they spend most of the day sleeping, they may some- 

 times be seen leisurely strolling in the open, and they often 

 return to their resting-places after sunrise, and leave them 

 before sunset — although even under such circumstances it is 

 only exceptionally that they hunt except under cover of 

 darkness. Once we came on a big male lion in mid-after- 

 noon walking back across the open plain to a zebra he had 

 killed on the previous night; and once, at the same time of 

 day, we came on a lioness leading her cubs back to the 

 carcass of a wildebeest, also slain overnight. On another 

 afternoon we came across a lion and lioness gazing intently 

 at an old bull wildebeest which was returning their stare, 

 very much on the alert, at a distance of sixty yards. i 



Except when resting and in the breeding-season, the 



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