86 THE LAND OF THE LION 



chance it to my left. It instantaneously occurred to me 

 that in that direction lay the steep river valley on whose 

 edge we had been hunting, and there was more probability 

 of the lions denning up for the heat of the day among its 

 rocks, than in the opener country to the right. The lions 

 couldn't see me, the danger was that they would smell, 

 and that increased moment by moment. I might crawl 

 fifty yards nearer, and chance a shot through the tough 

 intervening thorn stems, but I knew that would be foolish- 

 ness. The band would scatter, the surrounding cover was 

 long and I might get nothing at all. If I got a shot, on the 

 other hand, at the leader, lion or lioness, I was likely to hit 

 a fine animal. 



These thoughts and hopes, and far more unnerving 

 desperate fears, that after all I could not get one, that they 

 would escape me, whirled through my brain, as I sat still, 

 before I made up my mind what I would do. I knew of 

 course that if the wind did give me away, the lions might 

 just retire behind the ant heap they were lying on, and then 

 it was "good-bye" and all my trouble to begin over again. 

 But I was not without hope that when they got the wind, 

 they would come forth just for one moment to make sure, 

 and I staked my all on that. If hard luck had been mine in 

 my long waiting, surely fortune would smile on me at last. 

 I crawled away from my men, ignoring a last agonized 

 whisper from Dooda, and sat up in the grass, here two feet 

 high, where I could command the side toward the river, 

 I rested my elbows on my knees and waited. 



Was there a big lion among them? Would they clear 

 at once ? or would they wait and make sure ? Would they 

 stand ? Would they charge ? I had my tense, glorious 

 moment surely. I could hear the panting breath of the two 

 men who had crawled out after me, and were now crouching 

 beside me. And then at the long last fortune smiled on me 

 indeed. I saw a movement among the fawny mass. And 



