34 
THE LION. 
The lion in the Cape Colony, and other more in¬ 
habited parts of Southern Africa, frequently—as 
shewn—carries, or drags, his prey to a considerable 
distance before devouring it; but in the interior of 
the country, where the population is scanty, and 
the beast subject to but little molestation, he, for 
the most part, either feasts on it where it fell, or 
removes it to some thicket in the immediate vicinity ; 
and after he has satisfied his hunger for the time 
being, which with a half-famished lion occupies 
no little time, he either crouches beside it, or in 
some retired spot near at hand. “ Here,” according 
to Delegorgue, “ he keeps guard over the remainder 
of the carcase, from which both by night and day he 
drives away all carnivorous animals that would 
share it with him. As regards quadrupeds, he has 
little trouble, for they, knowing his powers, obey 
without reflection, and remain on the watch at 
twenty, thirty, and forty paces distance, waiting 
until such time as the 6 Master ’ leaves the spot 
with a firm and grave step, and abandons to them 
the residue of his royal repast; but those who give 
him most trouble are the vultures,* who, alighting 
on the carcase, are always bearing away somethiug 
in spite of the king of the forest, or the flourish of 
his formidable paws.” 
Notwithstanding the respect usually shewn to the 
wrist, they are those of a full-grown male lion; if smaller, of a lioness 
or a young lion.” 
* Elsewhere Delegorgue, in his interesting work, tells us “ that 
on one occasion he came on the carcase of a newly slain elephant, 
so thickly covered with vultures that with a single ball he put no 
fewer than nine of these disgusting birds hors de combat. 
