52 THE LION KILLER. 



I'll give you, besides the horse, the girl you love in mar- 

 riage." 



This offer shook, for an instant, the determination of the 

 boy, but only for an instant, and raising up with pride in his 

 glance, he replied : 



" My fatfyer, you know that in our country, and more par- 

 ticularly in our tribe, the women despise a man who is a 

 man only in name, and who is good for nothing except to 

 beget children like himself. If I am of the tribe of Ouled 

 Cessi, and the son of your loins, the woman who will marry 

 me must be proud of me. Now this is my final decision, if 

 you do not let me hunt the lion to-day, I not only will refuse 

 your offer of wife and horse, but I will also leave your tent, 

 and go away where I can conceal my shame from the eyes 

 of my friends." 



Whether it is the effect of the education of these half 

 t Bavage men, or it is an instinct imbued in their minds by 

 the associations of their desert life, to produce so much 

 bravery in a beardless boy, I cannot tell ; but at least it is 

 noble, and the reader, when entering on a dangerous hunt, 

 would do well to cho # ose such a boy as his comrade. 



I put an end to the scene by reassuring the father upon 

 the success of the day, and at the same time complimenting 

 the boy for his courage. I then informed the company of 

 the plan of attack I had adopted, and I invited the poor 

 devil, who had been so mercilessly ridiculed by his comrades, 

 to stay by me and carry my second gun, and gain a better 

 title to fame than the mishaps that had occurred to his own 

 person. 



