328 
IN AFRICA 
stretch out and sleep while the other one remains 
awake and keeps guard. 
When I went to Africa I resolved never to climb 
a tree. Later I resolved to try the tree method in 
order to get experience in a form of lion hunting 
that has many advocates among the valiant hunters 
who want lion skins at no expense to their own. 
Of course, there are some perils connected with 
this method of lion slaying. Mosquitoes may bite 
you, causing a dreadful fever that may later result 
in death in some lingering and costly form. Also 
the biting ants may pursue you up to your aery 
perch and take small but effective bites in many 
itchable but unscratchable points. These elements 
of danger are about the only ones encountered in 
the tree method of lion hunting, but then who could 
expect to kill lions without some degree of personal 
discomfort? 
My one and only tree experience was not par¬ 
ticularly eventful. A large and commodious plat¬ 
form was built in the forks of a great tree in a 
district where the questing grunt of lions could be 
heard each night. The platform was comfort¬ 
able ; it only needed hot and cold running water to 
be a delightful place to spend a tropic night. 
I shot a hartebeest and had it dragged beneath 
the tree. Then my two native gunbearers and I 
made a satisfactory ascent to the platform. We 
had a thermos bottle filled with hot tea, and some 
odds and ends in the way of solid refreshments. 
We then stretched out in positions that commanded 
