NOTES ON SOMALILAND. 283 
all, On our present trip, for instance, we arrived at a place where there were 
a good many villages, of which the inhabitants possessed large herds of 
cattle, Three or four lions had taken up their abode in the neighbourhood, 
and levied almost nightly toll on their cattle, We looked forward to get- 
ting good sport there, but on arrival we soon perceived the reason both for 
the presence of these blackmailers and for their immunity from reprisals on 
the part of the villagers, The chief feature of the locality was a big dry 
“Tue” or watercourse, fringed with long strips of dense reeds 8 or 9 feet 
high, The lions used to come out at night, usually in couples, obtain their 
dinner by fair means or foul, and then return to their fastness, from which it 
was impossible to dislodge them, We tried burning the reeds without success, 
they were too green and moist to burn; next we endeavoured to get our herd 
of camelsin, but they altogether refused to come to the scratch, and the 
patches were too big to beat with a few men, 
Here then there was no way of getting at them except by sitting over a 
bait, and we did account for one in this way, but not without a good deal of 
trouble. Wehadalong morning’s work the next day, ending with a very 
businesslike charge at my companion, before the lion was finally brought to 
bag. The place in question was the exact counterpart of the tiger-beat so 
often met with in our Indian Terais,—one of those that provide a fresh tiger, 
season after season—and it is sure to hold a lion or two for along time to 
come, What one would have given worlds for was a line of Indian elephants, 
but unfortunately the education of the African species has been entirely 
neglected in this as in all respects. 
At present, I should say there were as many lions in the area known as 
“The Aden Garrison Reserve” as anywhere else in tle Protectorate, and I 
really think the said Reserve might well be thrown open to all Brilish officers 
on leave, as the Aden garrison would appear of late to have made very little 
use of their privilege, and consequently there are many parts of it that have 
not been shot for years. Moreover now that the Administration of the Pro- 
tectorate has been transferred from the Indian Government to the Foreign 
Office in London, the special claims of Aden’s very migratory garrison seem no 
Jonger to exist, 
Lions in Somaliland are of two very distinct types, There is first the 
bold, bad variety that lurks about in the vicinity of nomad villages, and 
follows their movements from one grazing-ground to another, His physiog- 
nomy and the size and shape of his “ pugs”’ are familiar to every mother’s son 
of the community, and time after time he levies tribute upon their livestock, 
and only resorts to stalking antelopes when the more convenient source of 
supply temporarily fails him, The annual mortality among Somali cattle from 
this cause must be enormous, but the people are so used to the visitation, and 
jb is such an ever-present form of excitement and theme of conversation, that 
I really think they would miss it if they did not get it, At any rate it ig 
