THE LION PLAYS SOFT PEDAL 113 



Not securing anything he returned to the 

 beaver house and lay down in another spot. 

 Again he must have waited and waited, pa- 

 tiently as an Eskimo by a seal hole. 



A lion has the capacity to lie long in waiting, 

 and I have known of their remaining on a low 

 cliff, watchful and expectant of a kill, for nearly 

 thirty hours. At last a beaver had come forth, 

 but whether in the daytime or at night I could 

 not be certain. A line of dim, muddy tracks led 

 from the hole and ended several feet beyond with 

 the ice stained with blood and fur. 



One autumn when I was tramping in high 

 altitudes I saw many news stories in which lions 

 had a part. Two cottontail rabbits and one 

 snowshoe had been captured by the same lion 

 in less than twenty-four hours. A few miles 

 farther on this lion came upon the track of a 

 three-footed lynx with a bleeding, broken fore- 

 paw, as the snow records fully showed. The lion 

 followed these tracks nearly two miles where 

 they entered a den. Here the lion lay down to 

 watch and perhaps rolled over on his side for a 

 snooze. But the cat had not come out. 



This same lion a day or so later had come 

 upon my tracks in the edge of an opening. He 

 first edged away from them and walked entirely 

 around the opening and came back to the tracks 

 near where he had first seen them. Here he 



