THE ATHI EIVER 209 



tliere nor anywhere else is the lion an easy prize — quite 

 the reverse. The element of luck enters large. Both 

 in South and East Africa men may spend years and yet 

 never chance to see, much less to shoot, a lion. A new- 

 comer, on the other hand, may fall in with a " soft " 

 chance in his first week. There is here a system by which 

 success may be made fairly secure, to which I refer later. 



The first ravine we tried held a lion. We two were 

 in ambush at its mouth, and had sent some twenty-five 

 beaters round the flank with specific instructions to go 

 in at the extreme head of the gorge. Instead, they had 

 commenced to enter when only half-way up. From my 

 position (we were commanding the outlet on opposite 

 sides) I saw this lazy move, and at once checked it. 

 The mischief, however, was done. The lion lay not far 

 below the head of the gorge, and, although he remained 

 quiescent till the beaters had arrived within 100 yards, 

 he had fully appreciated the previous false move, and, 

 instead of taking the direct course down the glen, he 

 bounded up the steep bank on the south and gained the 

 table-land above. 



A mounted Somali hunter, whom I had placed behind 

 on the chance of his being able to ride the lion to a stand, 

 gave him a bit of a run, but the ground was bad and 

 the start too great. 



After this failure we always went one gun with the 

 beaters — or, rather, 100 yards in advance — the other 

 being posted at the outlet of each gorge. 



It was exciting work for the advanced gun, standing 



in front of each dense clump of bush, or tumbled pile of 



rocks — often when two such holts were being beaten at 



once — while the crowd of yelling savages swarmed in from 



above or behind, and showers of stones came hurtling 



and crashing downwards through the covert. Many of 



these ravines, moreover, had a most "lionous" smell, 



which constantly induced a belief that the king of beasts 



was close by. But this scent was a deception, arising 



from an aromatic shrub. 



, During three weeks spent on the Athi we drove 



p 



