254 LAKGE GAME. CHAP. v. 



the brute might be shot if he could once obtain possession 

 of it, and after another ten minutes, to see whether the 

 animal would make any movement, he determined to try 

 and reach it. Silently and quietly he moved down, foot 

 by foot, until only such a distance intervened between 

 him and his prize as could be overcome by stooping ; but 

 while in the act of doing so a gentle, and without doubt a 

 perfectly involuntary, vibration of the brute's tail warned 

 him that he was observed. He had presence of mind 

 enough to know that any hurried movement would pre- 

 cipitate its spring, while he was equally aware that no 

 time was to be lost ; so, abandoning the gun, he quietly 

 straightened himself, feeling with his upraised hand for a 

 branch to trust to, while his eyes never left the lion's 

 body. He was not a second too soon, for as his hand 

 found and grasped the support it sought, his treacherous 

 adversary bounded upwards, not in time to catch him 

 indeed, but so nearly that he could feel the rush of the 

 displaced air. 



The disappointed brute roared furiously with rage at 

 this second defeat, but wasting no further time where it 

 saw it was useless, stalked away, took up the body of the 

 man it had last killed, and having carried it to the other, 

 lay down beside them both. A few minutes afterwards 

 it was saluted with a six-to-the-pound bullet in its ribs, 

 making it roar as only a wounded lion can, and charge up 

 to the tree in hot haste. Of course, such a large-bored 

 elephant-gun was only a single-barrel, and before it could 

 be again loaded the savage beast had disappeared in the 

 reeds, though, one is thankful to think, carrying its death- 

 wound as a reward for its unprovoked attack. 



