200 



AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 



toward where the man was pointing. Tarlton took his big 

 double-barrel and advised me to take mine, as the sun 

 had just set and it was likely to be close work; but I shook 

 my head, for the Winchester .405 is, at least for me per- 

 sonally, the "medicine gun" for lions. In another mo- 

 ment up she jumped, and galloped slowly down the other 

 side of the donga, switching her tail and growling; I scram- 

 bled across the donga, and just before she went round a 

 clump of trees, eighty yards off, I fired. The bullet hit 



her fair, and going forward 

 injured her spine. Over she 

 rolled, growling savagely, and 

 dragged herself into the water- 

 course; and running forward 

 I finished 

 her with two 

 bullets be- 

 hind the 

 shou Ider. 

 She was a 

 big, fat lion- 

 ess, very old, 

 with two 



cubs inside her; her lower canines were much worn and 

 injured. She was very heavy, and probably weighed con- 

 siderably over three hundred pounds. 



The light was growing dim, and camp was eight or 

 ten miles away. The porters they are always much ex- 

 cited over the death of a lion wished to carry the body 

 whole to camp, and I let them try. While they were lashing 

 it to a pole another lion began to moan hungrily half a 

 mile away. Then we started; there was no moon, but the 

 night was clear and we could guide ourselves by the stars. 

 The porters staggered under their heavy load, and we 

 made slow progress; most of the time Tarlton and I walked, 

 with our double-barrels in our hands, for it was a dan- 

 gerous neighborhood. Again and again we heard lions, and 



t^f -. \ a 



Extreme form of Roberts' gazelle 

 From a photograph by Edmund Heller 



