322 
IN AFRICA 
We sat down in despair. The greatest chance of 
the whole trip was gone. 
“That’s the last we’ll see of them,” said I 
oracularly as I sat upon a stone. My hand was 
covered with blood, but alas! it was mine and not the 
lion’s. 
The carriage appeared and we held a prolonged 
consolation meeting. Suddenly our general utility 
boy, Happy Bill, uttered a low cry of warning. 
We turned, and there, in the valley ahead of us, 
the three lions were again seen. They had evidently 
passed through the reeds without stopping and had 
continued across only a few yards from where we 
were now standing. 
Fate seemed determined to give us plenty of 
chances to get these lions. Again we opened fire 
on them at about four or five hundred yards. My 
big-gun ammunition was gone, so I fired with my 
. 256 . 
No result! The distance was too great and our 
bombardment was fruitless. The black-maned lion 
was in a bad humor and repeatedly turned as if 
intent to stop and defend his outraged dignity. In 
a few moments the three lions disappeared in the 
tall grass that fringed a big reed bed many acres 
in extent. 
For an hour we raked the reed bed with shot, 
hoping to drive them from cover. But that was the 
last we saw of the lions. A little bunch of water- 
buck does were scared up, but nothing else. The 
lions were now safe, for nothing less than fifty 
