LION HUNTING ON THE KAPITI PLAINS 85 



ten yards distant or running away. Fortunately, they 

 adopted the latter course. Right in front of me, thirty 

 yards off, there appeared, from behind the bushes which 

 had first screened him from my eyes, the tawny, galloping 

 form of a big maneless lion. Crack! the Winchester spoke; 

 and as the soft-nosed bullet ploughed forward through his 

 flank the lion swerved so that I missed him with the second 

 shot; but my third bullet went through the spine and for- 

 ward into his chest. Down he came, sixty yards off, his 

 hind quarters dragging, his head up, his ears back, his 

 jaws open and lips drawn up in a prodigious snarl, as he 

 endeavored to turn to face us. His back was broken; but 

 of this we could not at the moment be sure, and if it had 

 merely been grazed, he might have recovered, and then, 

 even though dying, his charge might have done mischief. 

 So Kermit, Sir Alfred, and I fired, almost together, into his 

 chest. His head sank, and he died. 



This lion had come out on the left of the bushes; the 

 other, to the right of them, had not been hit, and we saw 

 him galloping off across the plain, six or eight hundred 

 yards away. A couple more shots missed, and we mounted 

 our horses to try to ride him down. The plain sloped 

 gently upward for three-quarters of a mile to a low crest or 

 divide, and long before we got near him he disappeared 

 over this. Sir Alfred and Kermit were tearing along in 

 front and to the right, with Miss Pease close behind; while 

 Tranquillity carried me, as fast as he could, on the left, 

 with Medlicott near me. On topping the divide Sir Al- 

 fred and Kermit missed the lion, which had swung to the 

 left, and they raced ahead too far to the right. Medlicott 

 and I, however, saw the lion, loping along close behind some 

 kongoni; and this enabled me to get up to him as quickly as 

 the lighter men on the faster horses. The going was now 

 slightly downhill, and the sorrel took me along very well, 

 while Medlicott, whose horse was slow, bore to the right 

 and joined the other two men. We gained rapidly, and, 

 finding out this, the lion suddenly halted and came to bay 



