THE FLESH-EATERS 21 



infest the Orange Free State in the days some fifty 

 or sixty years ago when game was inordinately 

 plentiful, and the Boers were settling in their new 

 country. Somaliland lions are, as a rule, smaller 

 than those found in other parts of Africa. A good 

 big lion will stand as much as three feet six or three 

 feet eight inches at the shoulder, and will weigh not 

 far short of five hundred pounds. His strength is, 

 of course, enormous, and he can master and pull 

 down practically every animal in Africa, except the 

 rhinoceros and elephant animals with which he 

 seems carefully to avoid quarrelling. C. J. Anders- 

 son certainly records an instance where a black 

 rhinoceros, severely wounded by him, had been 

 attacked and even mauled by a brace of lions, which, 

 no doubt attracted by the scent of blood, had tried 

 conclusions with that gigantic beast. The rhinoceros, 

 however, in spite of its wounded condition, had 

 managed to beat them off, only itself to fall on the 

 following morning to the rifle of the human hunter. 

 Buffaloes, especially full-grown males, are creatures 

 of such tremendous strength and weight that a 

 pair of lions or more are probably often required to 

 conquer them and pull them down. Oswell and 

 Vardon, two of the greatest of English hunters, one 

 day, shooting along the Limpopo, were witnesses of 

 an extraordinary combat between an old buffalo 

 bull and three lions. The bull had been wounded 

 by Vardon, and the two hunters presently came upon 

 it while waging a most gallant but unequal fight 

 against three big male lions, which, with teeth and 



