IMMENSE BOUNDS. 20 



had lain to where he alighted," says Delegorgue, 

 " measured eighteen* of my paces," and elsewhere 

 the same author, when speaking of another of those 

 beasts, accidentally disturbed by him from its 

 slumbers, informs us : " He rose, gathered himself 

 up, and bounded forward (presenting to us his 

 broadside), to alight at fifteen paces distance, when he 

 bounded again. He seemed to fly. His mane re- 

 sembled a pair of wings ; but I and my companions 

 were so confounded and amazed at the sight, as to 

 put all thoughts of firing out of our heads. The 

 rapidity of the animal's bounds would, indeed, have 

 rendered the attempt useless an arrow from the 

 bow, or the falcon when stooping on the quarry, 

 are not more rapid in their flight." 



The height to which the lion can leap is also very 

 great otherwise, why are the pit-falls in Algeria 

 for the capture of this animal, as Gerard tells us is 

 the case, ten metres in depth. Moffatt, indeed, 

 speaks of the beast jumping on to a rock ten to twelve 

 feet in altitude ; and Thomson, when describing 

 a lion-hunt, says : " He (the lion) bounded over 

 the adjacent thicket like a cat over a foot-stool, 

 clearing brake and bushes twelve or fifteen feet high 

 as readily as if they had been tufts of grass." Dele- 

 gorgue's evidence is to the like effect. After tolling 

 us that he had one evening killed & ('nfn l>!cl><tf< 



* I can quite credit Delegorgue's statement as to tin- extent of 

 ground covered by the lion in its bound ; the rather as, with people 

 generally such at least is the casein Sweden the pace usually em- 

 braces little more than two feet. Moreover, if I mistake not, a 

 horse in England has been known to leap a rivulet thirty-four feet 

 broad. 



