HABITS OF THE LION. 77 



afraid to make a spring. On another occasion, one of our 

 party was lying sound asleep and unconscious of danger 

 between two natives behind a bush at Mashiie ; the fire was 

 nearly out at their feet in consequence of all being com- 

 pletely tired out by the fatigues of the previous day : a lion 

 came up to within three yards of the fire, and there com- 

 menced roaring instead of making a spring : the fact of 

 their riding-ox being tied to the bush was the only reason 

 the lion had for not following his instinct and making a 

 meal of flesh. He then stood on a knoll three hundred 

 yards distant, and roared all night, and continued his 

 growling as the party moved off by daylight next morning. 

 Nothing that I ever learned of the lion would lead me to 

 attribute to it either the ferocious or noble character ascribed 

 co it elsewhere. It possesses none of the nobility of the 

 Newfoundland or St. Bernard dogs. With respect to its 

 great strength there can be no doubt. The immense masses 

 of muscle around its jaws, shoulders, and forearms pro- 

 claim tremendous force. They would seem, however, to 

 be inferior in power to those of the Indian tiger. Most of 

 those feats of strength that I have seen performed by lions, 

 such as the taking away of an ox, were not carrying, but 

 dragging or trailing the carcass along the ground : they 

 have sprung on some occasions on to the hind-quarters of 

 a horse, but no one has ever seen them on the withers of 

 a giraffe. They do not mount on the hind-quarters of an 

 eland even, but try to tear him down with their claws. 

 Messrs. Oswell and Vardon once saw three lions endeavor- 

 ing to drag down a buffalo, and they were unable to do so 

 for a time, though he was then mortally wounded by a 

 two-ounce ball.* 



* This singular encounter, in the words of an eye-witness, happened 

 as follows : — 



"My South African Journal is now before me, and I have got hold of 

 the account of the lion and buffalo affair ; here it is : — ' 15th September, 

 1846. Oswell and I were riding this afternoon along th* banks of the 



7* 



