28 DAYS AND NIGHTS BY THE DESERT. 



thing, I struck a course for a crantz that promised to 

 afford me a chance of shelter. Keeping along the 

 edge of the kloof, I found just such a place as 

 desired a drop of four feet to a ledge thirty or 

 forty inches wide, and afterwards an almost perpen- 

 dicular descent of fifty or sixty feet, terminating in a 

 quantity of broken boulders and jagged stone, rough 

 enough in all conscience to break the legs of a 

 baboon or klip-springer, if either should fall upon 

 them from above. 



" With as little appearance of alarm as I could 

 assume, I sat down on the edge of the precipice and 

 smoked my pipe, ever and anon taking a sly, but 

 careful glance behind to see where my foe was. 



" He evidently was an artful old scoundrel, but I 

 was determined to be his equal in cunning. 



" About twenty rods behind me were a few 

 ragged bushes, growing among some scattered 

 stones ; behind these the lion had taken shelter, and 

 was keeping a most careful survey upon all my 

 actions. Nearer to me were some more boulders, 

 small and detached ; still, sufficiently large to afford 

 the brute shelter before he made the final spring. 



"You will see by this that I had calculated to a 

 nicety what would be the plan of assault followed by 

 my pursuer ; at the same time, I felt convinced that 

 the lion, feeling certain that I could not escape him, 

 would defer his final proceedings till dusk. 



" Afraid I was not ! I could not afford to be so ; 



