246 ON SAFARI 



pellecl by tlie grand reverberating roar of a lion, followed 

 by a wliinu3'ing resj^onse — both apjoarently close on our 

 front, tliough really 250 yards ahead. At this crucial 



moment, as chance had fixed it, W , misjudging the 



distance, and assuming that we were already on top of 

 the lions, pressed forward "to walk them up" on his 

 own. Nothing we could do availed to check that im- 

 petuous fatality. Yama implored me, " Stop your 

 brother — stop — not that way — stalk." It was in vain ; 

 signals, whistles, all ignored, it only remained to us to 

 follow on through grass not three feet high. At a long 

 100 yards the lion stood up, gazed, and turned away. 



W fired, and I then saw the flat head of a lioness 



appear above the grass. At my first shot she rushed to 

 right ; at the second stopped dead, turned and bolted back. 



W shouted that both were down ; but that, I knew, 



was not the case ; and, on running forward, I got a 

 clear view of the lion, a magnificent heavily-maned beast, 

 walking majestically with long-swinging stride beyond 

 the river, 500 yards away. Against the low-rising sun he 

 stood out dark, silhouetted as a daguerreotype, his mane 

 all rough and " touzley," and he walked quite slowly and 

 unconcerned. There was still a chance to shoot — fair, 

 though remote — but so entranced was I with that rare 

 spectacle, that the rifle was forgotten. 



It was over — the best chance we had at lion thrown 

 away. My brother, usually most cautious and pains- 

 taking, agrees with the facts as above set out, but con- 

 siders All more to blame in misjudging the distance — it 

 was kismet, predestined. As Yama insisted, we might, 

 by a careful stalk, have crept in as near as we cared. 



Of course we took the spoor of both lions, assuring 

 ourselves that neither had been hit. Not a vestige of 

 the hartebeests remained beyond the vertebrae and some 

 big bones. 



On the campward way we sighted a single or3^x (the 

 first of the callotis kind that I had seen) in company 

 with hundreds of kongoni. I took the stalk, but failed to 

 approach within 500 yards. At that distance, through 



