78 THE LAND OF THE LION 
my saddle bags, and hobbled in, getting through the few 
yards that separated me from the centre as quickly as | 
could. Mombo the Kikuyu gunbearer had been pulled 
down —a good fellow, brave to recklessness, very unlike 
Kikuyu generally, but who had had no experience of lions 
in cover 
Momba had come on the lion near the river bank. 
He was on the extreme right of our line of beaters. The 
wounded beast was nearly done. When Mombo stumbled 
on him he could scarcely raise himself out of his lair — 
one shot would have finished him. But Momba, like almost 
all black men, could hit nothing with the rifle, and at a few 
feet’s distance missed him two or three times. The men 
near him who had guns did the same. One good shot 
would have been enough, but none came, and slowly it 
seemed the great beast closed on him. All he.could do 
was to throw himself backward into the brush, and that 
was so thick it doubtless saved his life. The lion grabbed 
him by the left arm, and somehow took at the same time 
the stock of his rifle in his mouth. The lower teeth bit 
into the tough wood and this somewhat saved the arm. 
The lion tried to draw the man toward and under him, but 
the stout brush held the poor fellow, and saved him also from 
the deadly claw, worse than tooth wounds, for they soon bring 
gangrene. The lion let his first hold go, taking a second 
to draw him down, but he was wounded to death and the 
brush was thick and tough. Then he let the man go, and 
turning back struck the line in the middle, where the hunter 
and J. J. W.’s gunbearer stood. Both these shot at him with 
.350 rifles two or three times each, and he sank down dead 
with two bullets in the chest. The buliets were in all like- 
lihood fired by the hunter, for, though Noor, J. J. W.’s 
Somali, is a steady man, and never for a moment flinched, 
he is, like most Somalis, a very indifferent shot. 
When the great beast was down everyone cheered, for 
