252 THE MAN-EATERS OF TSAVO CHAP. 
other men of the party, having become frightened 
when left by himself. The result of his dis- 
obedience was that now I could not tell where lay 
the dead lion—or, rather, the lion which I believed to 
be dead ; but I had no intention of losing so fine a 
trophy, so I began a systematic search, dividing the 
jungle into strips, and thus going over the whole 
place thoroughly. The task of finding him, however, 
was not so easy as might be thought ; the chase after 
the lioness had taken us some distance from where 
I had shot him, and as there were numbers of trees 
about similar to that under which he fell, it was 
really a very difficult matter to hit upon the right 
place. Atlast one of the men sang out joyfully that 
he had found the lion—at the same time running 
away from the spot as hard as ever he could. A 
number of those nearest to him, both Indians and 
natives, had more courage or curiosity, and went up 
to have a look at the beast. I shouted to them as 
I hurried along to be careful and not to go too near, 
in case by any chance he might not be dead ; but 
they paid little heed to the warning, and by the 
time 1 got up, some half-dozen of them were 
gathered in a group at the lion’s tail, gesticulating 
wildly and chattering each in his own language, and 
all very pleased and excited. On getting near I 
asked if the lion was dead, and was told that he 
was nearly so, but that he still breathed. He was 
