x DEATH OF THE SECOND MAN-EATER 1o1 
he was up once more and coming for me as fast as 
he could in his crippled condition. A third shot 
had no apparent effect, so I put out my hand for the 
Martini, hoping to stop him with it. To my dismay, 
however, it was not there. The terror of the sud- 
den charge had proved too much for Mahina, and 
both he and the carbine were by this time well on their 
way up a tree. In the circumstances there was 
nothing to do but follow suit, which I did without 
loss of time: and but for the fact that one of my shots 
had broken a hind leg, the brute would most certainly 
have had me. Even as it was, I had barely time to 
swing myself up out of his reach before he arrived at 
the foot of the tree. 
When the lion found he was too late, he started to’ 
limp back to the thicket ; but by this time I had 
seized the carbine from Mahina, and the first shot I 
fired from it seemed to give him his quietus, for he 
fell over and lay motionless. Rather foolishly, I at 
once scrambled down from the tree and walked up to- 
wards him. To my surprise and no little alarm 
he jumped up and attempted another charge. This 
time, however, a Martini bullet in the chest and 
another in the head finished him for good and all; 
he dropped in his tracks not five yards away from 
me, and died gamely, biting savagely at a branch 
which had fallen to the ground. 
By this time all the workmen in camp, attracted 
