346 TRAVELS IN 
the mountain, a lion had occasioned some httle stir in the 
country, \yiiich had not yet entirely subsided. A Hottentot 
belonging to one of the farmers had endeavoured' for some 
time, in vain, to drive his master's cattle into a pool of water 
enclosed between two ridges of rock, when at length he 
espied a huge lion couching in the midst of the pool i terri- 
fied at the unexpected sight of a monster, whose eyes seemed 
to be fixed upon him, he instantly, took to his heels, leaving 
the cattle to shift for themselves. In doing this he had the 
presence of mind to break through the herd, concluding that, 
if the lion should pursue, he might content himself with the 
first beast that came in his way. In this, however, he was 
mistaken. The lion rushed through the herd, making di- 
rectly after the Hottentot, who, on turning round, and per- 
ceiving that the monster had singled him out for a meal', 
breathless and half dead with terror, scrambled up the stem 
of one of the tree Aloes, in the trunk of which had luckily 
been cut out a few steps, the more readily to come at some 
birds' nests that its branches supported. At the same mo- 
ment the lion made a spring at him, but, missing his aim, 
fell upon the ground. In surly silence he walked round the 
tree, casting every now^ and then a dreadful look towards the 
poor Hottentot, who had crept behind the finches' nests that 
happened to have been constructed in the tree. 
There is in this part of Africa a small bird of the Loxia 
genus, which lives in a state of society with the rest of its 
species, in the same manner as the locust-eating thrush men- 
tioned in the account of a former journey. Like this bird, the 
finches also construct a whole republic of nests in one clump 
