CH. iiij VICTIMS OF BIG GAME 63 



as more dangerous than any otlier animal. A man who 

 has shot but a dozen or a score of these various animals, 

 all put together, is not entitled to express any but the 

 most tentativx^ opinion as to their relative prowess and 

 ferocity ; yet on the w'hole it seems to me that the 

 weight of opinion among those best fitted to judge 

 is that the lion is the most formidable oj)ponent of the 

 liuntcr, under ordinary conditions. Tliis is my own view. 

 Butwe must everkeep in mind tlie (act that the surround- 

 ing conditions, the geographical locality, and the wide 

 individual variation of temper within the ranks of each 

 species, must all be taken into account. In certain 

 circumstances a lion may be easily killed, whereas a 

 rhino w^ould be a dangerous foe. Under other con- 

 ditions the rhino could be attacked with impunity, and 

 the lion only with the utmost hazard ; and one bull 

 buffalo might flee and one bull elephant charge, and 

 yet the next couple met with might show an exact 

 reversal of behaviour. 



At any rate, during the last three or four years in 

 German and British East Africa and Uganda over fifty 

 w^hite men have been killed or mauled by lions, buffa- 

 loes, elephants, and rhinos, and the lions have much 

 the largest list of victims to their credit. In Nairobi 

 churchyard I w^as shown the graves of seven men who 

 had been killed by lions, and of one who had been killed 

 by a rhino. The first num to meet us on the African 

 shore was Mr. Campbell, Governor Jackson's A.D.C., 

 and only a year previously he had been badly mauled 

 by a lion. We met one gentleman who had been 

 crippled for life by a lioness. He had marked her into 

 some patches of brush, and, coming up, tried to put her 

 out of one thick clump. P'ailing, he thought she might 

 have gone into another thicket, and walked towards it. 



