SI/E AND WEIGHT. 17 



thought, with some reason, that lions should be the 

 largest and strongest of the race, goes on to say. 

 * The dried skin* of one of these animals measured 

 from nose to tail (the latter one metre in length) 

 three metres, fifty centimetres." 



The weight of the beast so far as I am aware 

 has never been correctly ascertained, but it is very 

 considerable ; and as I should imagine, cannot be 

 less than from five to six hundred pounds. 



The lion inhabiting Northern Africa would seem 

 to be fully as heavy as that common to the 

 more southern portion of the continent. Gerard, 

 when speaking of what he calls the "black lion," 

 which he describes as a trifle less than either the 

 "fawn-coloured" or the "grey," says: " The 

 breadth of his forehead is a coudf'e, the length 

 of his body from the nose to the insertion of the 

 tail, which is a metre long, measures five 

 coudces ; the weight of his body varies between two 

 hundred and seventy-five and three hundred /,//<>.$.'' 



Elsewhere, and when speaking of a huge lion (but 

 the species or variety he does not name), killed in a 

 great ckassc at which he was present, he tells us 

 that the beast must have weighed at least six hun- 

 dred livres, or some six hundred and sixty-one and 

 a-half English pounds. 



The strength of the lion is enormous ; in Algeria 

 according to Gerard the Arabs say it is equal to 

 that of forty men. Hans, my faithful attendant, 

 told me he had known an instance where the beast 

 had broken the back of a large ox whilst it was 

 yet alive. This feat the lion accomplished when 



