THE MERCY SHOT 



A Lion at 196 Yards. "I dropped a zebra in a small 

 volcanic crater and, after dissecting it, left it as bait. The 

 next morning I started before dawn for lion. With loaded gun, 

 I crept along over the stony ground until I was at the edge 

 of the crater and could look over the rim. A huge black- 

 maned lion filled my eye. He was lying 196 yards distant 

 and was near the zebra upon which he had been feeding. 

 At 196 yards, I shot that lion nine times with a Sauer 

 Mauser .3006, using steel-jacketed bullets, and on dissect- 

 ing I found no bullet had penetrated a vital organ. The 

 animal was killed by traumatic shock." 



A Lion at iS Feet. "I was tracking a lioness and two 

 cubs when the track turned abruptly into a dense growth 

 of thorn bush. Suddenly I came upon them lying in the 

 thicket just eighteen feet away. Making a quick calculation, 

 based on my dissection of a lion the evening before, I made 

 'the shoulder shot' with a Holland & Holland .465. The 

 lioness did not move, nor did she make a sound. The large 

 soft-nosed bullet had entered the middle of the shoulder, 

 just below the level of the spinal column, in the midst of the 

 great nerve trunks and within concussion distance of the 

 spinal cord." 1 



Of all the animals shot in this manner in our collecting 

 expeditions in 1927 and in 1935, not one escaped wounded. 



The brain and the nervous system control every move- 

 ment of the animal. It is the brain that drives every muscle 

 in escape or attack. Like a battery, the brain is wired to 

 every muscle and gland of the body. The brain of a lion 

 is to that lion what the power plant is to the electric 

 lighting system of a city. If the brain is hit the power of the 

 entire animal is instantly turned off. Therefore, a shot 

 through the brain causes instant death. The spinal cord is 



1 Excerpt from George Crile's unpublished African diary, 1927. 



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