GOOD-BYE SERGOIT 241 



well. He on the last lion's flank, H. on the leader's. I 

 was very near the white pony J. J. W.'s syce was riding, 

 when in an instant, the second lion turned between two 

 bushes and was literally swallowed up in the waving grass. 

 The leading beast held gallantly on past the covert, and H., 

 riding a few score yards furiously, turned him to bay under 

 a fine tree. There he stood, a noble sight indeed, advancing 

 first toward one man then toward the other. Right behind 

 him, not twenty yards away, was the cover that had swal- 

 lowed up his companion; but he seemed to want to fight, 

 and never even looked behind him for the support he surely 

 deserved. They might both be on us any moment. It 

 was a very nasty place indeed, the grass waving as high as 

 our ponies' backs. So I shot him just as quickly as I could. 

 We waited where we were for a quarter of an hour; no 

 knowing in the least where the second lion might be crouch- 

 ing, and frankly not too anxious to go into the thick cover 

 where the dead lion lay. After a while we went in and 

 measured and skinned him. He was a splendid beast, 

 with a rich, dark mane covering his shoulders. Not so 

 fine a one as J. J. W. shot on our way to the Rock, but a 

 very fine one and very large, nine feet eleven inches as he 

 lay. Four lions in three days, seven shots to the four, not 

 so bad ; and this one the very, very last I will ride in long 

 grass or bushy country. 



I thought I had had the very best of lion hunting, when 

 on the lower part of this same plateau three months 

 before, I got in five consecutive days three lions. I never 

 expect to experience any sensation quite equal to that 

 of the moment when, after five months' fruitless search, I 

 at last saw the great black-maned fellow step grandly out 

 of his harem, and stand alone in the morning sunlight 

 within one hundred and seventy yards of my rifle's muzzle. 

 It was a grand day's hunting too, when, from morning till 

 late afternoon, I followed up in long grass two lions I had 



