The Cal Tribe. 61 



of the cats, we will take each of the more important 

 members of the family in their order, and examine 

 their habits and mode of life. 



To begin with, we will take the Lion (Leo barbarus], 

 which stands at the head of the cat tribe the ac- 

 knowledged King of Beasts. No animal, and scarcely 

 even man, can hear without trembling his mighty roar, 

 and from his strength and courage he is feared by 

 every denizen of the forest. 



It is yet uncertain whether or not there is more than 

 one species of lion. Some authors suppose the 

 African lion, the Gambian lion, the Asiatic lion, etc., 

 to be different animals ; while others consider them to 

 be merely varieties of the same type, slightly modified 

 according to the country in which they live. 



The most widely known of these species, or varie- 

 ties, is the African lion, which is spread over the 

 whole of the southern part of that continent, excepting 

 those parts where civilised man has gained a permanent 

 footing, and driven the wild beasts from his neigh- 

 bourhood. 



The lion, when it has spent its life free and un- 

 trammelled in its native haunts, attains to considerable 

 dimensions, a full-grown animal averaging some four 

 feet in height at the shoulder, and nearly eleven feet in 

 total length from the nose to the tip of the tail. The 

 lioness is rather less in size, and, owing to her want 

 of mane, appears even smaller in comparison than is 

 really the case. 



The colour of the lion is a dark tawny yellow, deeper 

 on the back, and lighter on the under parts of the body. 

 The ears are blackish, and there is a thick tuft of hair 

 at the end of the tail, found in no other member of 

 the cat tribe, which is also black. The male lion, 

 when it has attained the age of three or four years, is 

 furnished with a shaggy mane of long hair, which falls 



