HUNTING LIONESSES. 



191 



After consulting together as to whether it were better to climh up 

 a tree or clamber on a rock, they asked my permission to remain 

 near the goat. This confidence pleased me and obtained them 

 the privilege of a place by my side. I had not been there a 

 quarter of an hour when the lioness appeared ; she found herseli 

 suddenly beside the goat, and looked about her with an air of 

 astonishment. I fired, and she fell without a struggle. ' The 

 Arabs were already kissing my hands, and I myself believed her 

 dead, when she got up again as though nothing was the matter, 

 and showed us all her teeth. One of the Arabs who had run 

 oward her was within six paces of her. On seeing her get up 

 ne clung to the lower branches of the tree to which the goat was 

 tied, and disappeared like a squirrel. The lioness fell dead at the 

 foot of the tree, a second' bullet piercing her heart. The first bad 

 passed out of the nape of the neck without breaking the skull 

 bone. 



