156 THE WILDERNESS AND JUNGLE 



high, and I saw no more of him until, a long- 

 way off, I saw him bounding along clean 

 through a herd of hartebeest, which made 

 way for him, but faced him, heads lowered." 



This curious and interesting experience 

 shows that some lions at any rate think 

 discretion the better part of valour. Well, 

 other kings have done the same before now ! 



Just as a cow-elephant is more likely to make 

 an unprovoked attack on man than a bull, so a 

 lioness is far more likely to fight for her consort 

 than her consort for her. Acting on this well- 

 known fact, Sir Henry Seton-Karr recom- 

 mends anyone coming on a lion and lioness 

 together to shoot the latter first. If the lion 

 be killed, the widow usually charges at once ; 

 but the death of the lioness is not always re- 

 sented in such violent fashion by the survivor. 



I have to thank Mr. Percy Reid for two 

 other stories, of which the first, at any rate, 

 shows the lion in a character anything but 

 heroic. Still, this may have been a cowardly 

 lion, and anyone who should emulate the 

 recklessness of Mr. Reid and his companion 

 might, with a braver individual to encounter, 

 pay for his temerity with his life. Mr. Reid 

 was out one morning along the banks of the 

 Majdi River and presently he saw^ silhouetted 

 on the horizon, what at first glance he took to 



