88 THE LION OF SOUTH AFRICA. 



Mr. Moffat says that he has seen bushmen, and even 

 women, compel a lion to leave the prey which he had 

 just seized, simply by shouting and making a noise. 



But this portrait ceases to be a correct one when the 

 lion is very hungry or has charge of young ones. 

 The cry of the stomach drowns the voice of prudence ; 

 the lion no longer distinguishes between black and 

 white ; and in a man he only sees a possible prey or 

 a certain enemy. 



" At Lopepe, a lioness sprang on the hind-quarter of 

 Mr.- Oswell's horse, and when we came up to him we 

 found the marks of the claws on the horse, and a 

 scratch on Mr. O.'s hand. The horse, on feeling the 

 lion on him, sprang away, and the rider, caught by a 

 wait-a-bit thorn, was brought to the ground and ren-. 

 dered insensible : his dogs saved him." 



Mr. Codrington, too, was attacked in the same way, 

 though not hunting the lion at the time ; but turning 

 round, he shot him dead in the neck. 



A widow woman was living in a very isolated dwell- 

 ing with her two sons, the eldest of whom was about 

 nineteen years old. One dark night they were awoke 

 by the lowing of the cattle enclosed in a yard at a 

 short distance. They ran for their arms. It was a 

 lion. He had broken through the palisade and made 

 horrible carnage amongst the cattle. Neither the 

 Hottentots nor the young men themselves dared to 



