CHAPTER IV 



AT GRIPS WITH THE LION 



Taking Qumano and a few other boys with me 

 next morning, we started a look round, though 

 no lions had been heard during the night. Two 

 miles from the camp we hit some fresh spoor, and 

 this, after examination, was reported to me as 

 being that of three lions who had gone that way 

 during the night, and the word was at once given 

 to take up the track. It was not easy country to 

 follow the spoor in, but eventually we found a 

 place where the lions had pounced upon and 

 killed a young two-year-old wildebeest e. Accord- 

 ing to their custom, the lions had dragged away 

 the offal and scratched sand over it, the carcase 

 itself having been removed and eaten close by. 

 Hardly anything remained except the hide, with 

 the bony part of the legs and skull attached to it, 

 and Qumano proudly cut off the miserable hind 

 legs above the hocks and transfixed them on his 

 little spear. In vain I tried to explain to him 

 that there were heaps of meat at my camp, that 

 his carrying such a prize was surely a slur on his 

 master's commissariat, and that he would make 

 me indeed appear a " hungry master/' The 



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