Leopard Killed 49 



on the leaves prevents you hearing anything ; and 

 the work, too, is somewhat dangerous, since you are 

 not only deafened but blinded. And then the lion is 

 very distrustful : nineteen times out of twenty he 

 will refuse the bait, or if he decides to take it he 

 will do it so quickly that your goat or piece of meat 

 is gone before you have had time to bring your rifle 

 to your shoulder. Note that he sees you very well 

 when you do not know of his presence, and that he 

 sometimes watches you for an hour unknown to 

 you. Experience and many unsuccessful endeavours 

 have told me that, quite apart from the danger run, 

 you lose your time without any chance of succeeding 

 by waiting for lions at a night-watch during the rainy 

 season. 



I have tried, with the assistance of the electric 

 projector, to shoot over the camp fence ; but the lion 

 saw everything I did, and kept out of the ray. I 

 have also set, across a path followed by lions, loaded 

 guns to be discharged when they touched a taut 

 string. By this means I have several times wounded 

 lions, but I have never killed one. On the contrary, 

 it will be seen by and by how I have proceeded 

 during the dry season and the success with which my 

 endeavours have been crowned several times. 



Our leopard, then, emboldened by hunger and 

 much less distrustful than his big brothers, returned 

 in the evening and sprang on to a tree so as to get 

 a better view of us. Only, he made the mistake of 

 doing this straight in front of me, and as I had 

 my Winchester within arm's reach, he received 



