With Flashlight and Rifle -* 



springs. Suddenly he breaks down then three or four 

 more staggering crooked springs, and suddenly he col- 

 lapses growling rather than roaring in his fury. I 

 cannot explain how it came about, but I now put 

 aside all caution and common sense. I ran on to within 

 1 20 paces of the wounded animal, fired and missed! 

 Now came the critical moment. On he came again with 

 a succession of frenzied springs. I knelt to my next 

 shot so as to manage it quietly and make dead certain 

 of it. Again he collapsed. Now for it ! One more 

 shot at a hundred paces, and my third lion springs into 

 the air, tumbles over backwards, and falls dead. 



In the madness of our delight we rushed up to where 

 he lay, spoilt by this success and forgetting all caution. 

 However, it was all right. He was quite dead an 

 even finer specimen than the one killed at midday, and 

 with a still darker mane. We skinned him quickly, as 

 soon as our rear-guard came up to us, about ten minutes 

 later. Head and paws were left unsevered from the rest 

 of the skin. In the stomach we found nothing in con- 

 trast with the lion shot in the early morning, whose 

 stomach we had found full of zebra-flesh and great pieces 

 of skin. This explained how this third lion came to be 

 so much more full of fight. 



Now something occurred which is rare indeed in 

 Africa with the native. My men lost the way, and 

 as we started on our return journey just as the sun 

 was setting we soon strayed. Six men were told 

 off to carry the heavy skin in relays of three and our 

 progress was made under very unsatisfactory conditions 



37 2 



