18 WILD ANIMALS. 



tile other extreme, and descinbe him with the adjectives mean, 

 cowardly, skulking, and indolent. Mr. Stanley in his book, "How 

 I found Livingstone," describing his first interview with a lion 

 and his endeavours to get a shot at him, says : " My surprise was 

 great when I cautiously laid my rifle against the tree and then 

 directed its muzzle to the spot where I had seen him stand. 

 Looking further away — to where the grass was thin and scant — I 

 .saw the animal bound along at a great rate, and that it was a 

 lion ; the noble monarch of the forest was in full flight ! From 

 that moment I ceased to regard him as the mightiest among the 

 brutes, or his roar as anything more fearful in broad daylight than 

 a sucking-dove's." Exactly, in broad daylight, but the animal, 

 being of nocturnal habits, is a very different character at night. In 

 a letter of Mr. 0. J. Andersson's, published some years ago, he tells 

 of a dangerous encounter he had with a lion. " One fine moon- 

 light night," he writes, " while watching for elephants, I encoun- 

 tered a troop of lions, and without any kind of molestation on my 

 part was suddenly attacked by the leader, a magnificent male. 

 Fortunately a well-directed bullet from my elephant rifle put him 

 at once hors de combat." 



No one can look at a lion and not acknowledge that he is a 

 wonderfully fine animal, and almost the personification of power 

 and might ; but it must be remembered that he is after all but a 

 cat, a cat of powerful size, but, nevertheless, physically and 

 morally a cat, and can only be correctly studied from this point of 

 view. A lion is endowed with no other virtues than the feline attrir 

 butes he inherits, being cunning, suspicious, vindictive, and stealthy, 

 not prone to attack under other cir.cumstances than those of his 

 own planning, and rarely in the open. Again, he does not appear 

 as a rule to attack man, except attacked or under the influence of 

 extreme hunger. It is during the night that he roams about in 

 search of prey, but during the day he is accustomed to retire to 

 some solitary spot where he can sleep at ease ; and when he is 

 met in daytime, probably through his having been disturbed, and 

 is moving his quarters, a traveller is apt to forget the chances are 

 he has a full stomach, and in consequence has no cause or wish 

 to attack ; this does not constitute cowardice. 



