WILDERNESS FOLK 91 



shows him what he is up against. He has all the wide 

 plain in which to flee. Yet he continues the attack, 

 roaring his defiance, until he falls, still facing his 

 enemy, his body pierced with a dozen fatal thrusts. 



I think the hyena offers the greatest contrast to 

 the lion. This slinking animal is cowardly, cruel, 

 selfish, unsocial and in a dozen other ways con- 

 temptible. I have seen a hyena run through a flock 

 of defenseless goats at night, hamstringing one after 

 another as he went for no reason on earth other than 

 the vicious joy of torturing them. Sometimes at a 

 waterhole he will break animals' backbones or other- 

 wise mutilate them and leave them to die. 



A hyena will lie in the bushes and spring out for 

 the young goats as they pass down the trail. He will 

 do this even when he is not hungry. He is a bom 

 murderer. A hyena is a coward and a sneak. I 

 remember meeting one unexpectedly near our camp. 

 His head was bleeding. Rarely have I seen such an 

 expression of ignominy on any cr eat tire. He had 

 been stealing out of one of our food boxes, and got it 

 caught about his head. 



One day we had just started to walk away from 

 camp when two hyenas came along. They didn't see 

 us at all. They were laughing away, like a pair of 

 fools, just as if they were two traveling men and one 

 had told a good joke. It was the first time I had 

 ever actually seen a hyena laugh. It was so funny 



