82 ADVENTURES OF AN ELEPHANT HUNTER CH. vn 



the woman's body where we had found it, hoping 

 that under cover of night the brutes would hie them 

 back to finish their meal and give us a chance of 

 avenging the poor creature's death. Making as 

 comfortable a perch as possible in the branches of a 

 convenient tree, rifle in hand, I kept a weary vigil 

 till dawn broke, but, throughout the long tropical 

 night, no lion's shape darkened the expanse of the 

 brightly moonlit shamba. 



Strange to relate, the native who had thus lost 

 wife and child in one afternoon was, a few days 

 after his bereavement, himself seized and devoured 

 by a crocodile. 



