MY FIRST LION 83 



times when I had had an unusually long and useless tramp 

 of it, that unlucky railroad engineer, running up and down 

 the best lion country, in his spider with his rifle in front of 

 him, yet never seeing a lion, would dismally recur to me. 

 My friend was sympathy itself and even offered to lend me 

 an Indian charm of potency immense, a notable chief had 

 given him long ago. But he kept seeing lions and I didn't. 

 It was almost three weeks since we had so bunglingly rounded 

 up J. J. W.'s first lion that I shot mine. 



We had made permanent camp near a fine spring of water, 

 and in a most excellent game country, some twenty miles 

 north of Sergoit. Five miles to the westward ran the deep 

 valley of the Nzoia and across it rose the Elgao ridges. The 

 grass on this bushy part of the country was by now beginning 

 to grow long. The herds do much to keep it down, but 

 especially among the thorn trees, in patches of a few acres, 

 it would partly hide the smaller antelope, and it seemed 

 to me that my chances of success lessened daily. One 

 morning, after almost four hours' hunting, about ten o'clock, 

 I was riding near the edge of the great Nzoia valley, when 

 suddenly I heard, or thought I heard, a low purring grunt. 

 I stopped my gunbearers and questioned them. The Somali, 

 Dooda, said it was only the mule, but Kongoni said simba, 

 and I felt myself that it was simba (lion). 



Now the lion makes a good many different noises (of that 

 much debated question more anon). But this little social 

 family circle grunt, is a most difficult sound to locate. In 

 this respect and in this alone, it is like the very, what shall I 

 .say? "trying" grunt angry lions and lionesses give when 

 they are near you in the grass. This may come from thirty 

 yards away, and it may be at your very feet. And I say 

 again, and advisedly, a cool man often cannot locate it at all. 

 Then if anything can beat him, the repetition of that growling 

 snarl coming from everywhere and nowhere surely will. 



After a good night's hunting, lions like to dry off a bit in 



