32 THE MAN-EATERS OF TSAVO CHAP. 
and began to lash himself madly against the bars of 
the cage, that they completely lost their heads and 
were actually too unnerved to fire. Not for some 
minutes—not, indeed, until Mr. Farquhar, whose 
post was close by, shouted at them and cheered 
them on—did they at all recover themselves. Then 
when at last they did begin to fire, they fired with a 
vengeance —anywhere, anyhow. Whitehead and I 
were at right angles to the direction in which they 
should have shot, and yet their bullets came whizzing 
all round us. Altogether they fired over a score of 
shots, and in the end succeeded only in blowing 
away one of the bars of the door, thus allowing our 
prize to make good his escape. How they failed to 
kill him several times over is, and always will be, a 
complete mystery to me, as they could have put the . 
muzzles of their rifles absolutely touching his body. 
There was, indeed, some blood scattered about the 
trap, but it was small consolation to know that the 
brute, whose capture and death seemed so certain, 
had only been slightly wounded. 
Still we were not unduly dejected, and when 
morning came, a hunt was at once arranged. 
Accordingly we spent the greater part of the day on 
our hands and knees following the lions through 
the dense thickets of thorny jungle, but though we 
heard their growls from time to, time, we never 
succeeded in actually coming up with them. Of the 
