SIZE AND WEIGHT. 
17 
thought, with some reason, that lions should be the 
largest and strongest of the race, goes on to say. 
c The dried shin* of one of these animals measured 
from nose to tail (the latter one metre in length) 
three metres, fifty centimetres.’ 5 
The weight of the beast—so far as I am aware— 
has never been correctly ascertained, but it is very 
considerable; and as I should imagine, cannot be 
less than from five to six hundred pounds. 
The lion inhabiting Northern Africa would seem 
to be fully as heavy as that common to the 
more southern portion of the continent. Gerard, 
when speaking of what he calls the “ black lion,” 
which he describes as a trifle less than either the 
“ fawn-coloured ” or the 46 grey,” says “ The 
breadth of his forehead is a coudee , the length 
of his body from the nose to- the insertion of the 
tail, which is a metre long, measures five 
coudees; the weight of his body varies between two 
hundred and seventy-five and three hundred kilos’* 
Elsewhere, and when speaking of a huge lion (but 
the species or variety he does not name), killed in a 
great chasse at which he was present, he tells us 
that the beast must have weighed at least six hun¬ 
dred livres, or some six hundred and sixty-one and 
a-half English pounds. 
The strength of the lion is enormous ; in Algeria 
—according to Gerard—the Arabs say it is equal to 
that of forty men. Hans, my faithful attendant, 
told me he had known an instance where the beast 
had broken the back of a large ox whilst it was 
yet alive. This feat the lion accomplished when 
o 
