I04 Wild Beasts 



is inevitable, he is always heroic, or even when danger 

 presses him too closely ... a lion in the shadow of death 

 remains a lion still." 



All things being equal, lions conduct themselves towards 

 mankind according to the suggestions of the time being 

 and their previous experiences. One that had just eaten 

 an antelope might pass by a man ; another might kill him. 

 The former, by all accounts, is the more likely to occur, 

 and it is said that Bushmen and other natives can tell by 

 the voice whether he is full or fasting ; and in the first case 

 have no fear that he will become aggressive without provo- 

 cation. When forbearance is not a matter of repletion, it 

 is no doubt, in some measure, the result of sloth. A lion 

 never does anything he can avoid doing. 



Baker's story of the lion that met a Nubian sheik with 

 two companions, and tore the leader to pieces, is one of a 

 great number of instances that might be brought forward 

 to show that wherever these animals are not conscious of 

 being put entirely at a disadvantage by superiority of arms, 

 they display little of that fear of man which is commonly 

 attributed to them. Poorly-armed tribes are under no 

 such delusion. The Ouled, Meloul, or Ouled Cassi Arabs 

 whose douars were attacked would have been as difficult to 

 persuade of the lion's timidity towards mankind, as those 

 Makubas on the Ghobe, or " the miserable Bakorus," whom 

 he devoured at his good pleasure. Dr. Schweinfurth 

 ("The Heart of Africa") was at an Egyptian garrison 

 where the soldiers were carried off from within their own 

 lines night after night. Moffat, Delgorgue, Livingstone, 

 Gumming, all record incidents of what they call his " des- 



