African Game Trails 
143 
food, milk, blood, and flesh, and they were 
fit for any fatigue or danger. Their faces 
were proud, cruel, fearless; as they ran 
they moved with long springy strides. 
Their head-dresses were fantastic; they 
carried ox-hide shields painted-with strange 
devices; and each bore in his right hand 
the formidable war spear, used both for 
stabbing and for throwing at close quar¬ 
ters. The narrow spear heads of soft iron 
were burnished till they shone like silver; 
they were four feet long, and the point and 
edges were razor sharp. The wooden haft 
appeared for but a few inches; the long 
butt was also of iron, ending in a spike, so 
that the spear looked almost solid metal. 
Yet each sinewy warrior carried his heavy 
weapon as if it were a toy, twirling it till it 
glinted in the sun rays. Herds of game, red 
hartebeests and striped zebra and wild 
swine, fled right and left before the ad¬ 
vance of the line. 
It was noon before we reached a wide, 
shallow valley, with beds of rushes here and 
there in the middle, and on either side high 
grass and dwarfed and scattered thorn- 
trees. Down this we beat for a couple of 
miles. Then, suddenly, a maned lion rose 
a quarter of a mile ahead of the line and 
galloped off through the high grass to the 
right; and all of us on horseback tore after 
him. 
He was a magnificent beast, with a black 
and tawny mane; in his prime, teeth and 
claws perfect, with mighty thews, and sav¬ 
age heart. He was lying near a hartebeest 
on which he had been feasting; his life had 
been one unbroken career of rapine and 
violence; and now the maned master of 
the wilderness, the terror that stalked by 
night, the grim lord of slaughter, was to 
meet his doom at the hands of the only foes 
who dared molest him. 
It was a mile before we brought him to 
bay. Then the Dutch farmer, Mouton, 
who had not even a rifle, but who rode fore¬ 
most, was almost on him; he halted and 
turned under a low thorn-tree, and we gal¬ 
loped past him to the opposite side, to hold 
him until the spearmen could come. It 
was a sore temptation to shoot him; but 
of course we could not break faith with 
our Nandi friends. We were only some 
sixty yards from him, and we watched 
him with our rifles ready, lest he should 
charge either us, or the first two or 
three spearmen, before their companions 
arrived. 
One by one the spearmen came up, at a 
run, and gradually began to form a ring 
round him. Each, when he came near 
enough, crouched behind his shield, his 
spear in his right hand, his fierce, eager 
face peering over the shield rim. As man 
followed man, the lion rose to his feet. His 
mane bristled, his tail lashed, he held his 
head low, the upper lip now drooping over 
the jaws, now drawn up so as to show the 
gleam of the long fangs. He faced first one 
way and then another, and never ceased to 
utter his murderous grunting roars. It 
was a wild sight; the ring of spearmen, in¬ 
tent, silent, bent on blood, and in the centre 
the great man-killing beast, his thunderous 
wrath growing ever more dangerous. 
At last the tense ring was complete, and 
the spearmen rose and closed in. The lion 
looked quickly from side to side, saw where 
the line was thinnest, and charged at his 
topmost speed. The crowded moment be¬ 
gan. With shields held steady, and quiver¬ 
ing spears poised, the men in front braced 
themselves for the rush and the shock; and 
from either hand the warriors sprang for¬ 
ward to take their foe in flank. Bounding 
ahead of his fellows; the leader reached 
throwing distance, the long spear flickered 
and plunged; as the lion felt the wound he 
half turned, and then flung himself on the 
man in front. The warrior threw his spear; 
it drove deep into the life, for entering at 
one shoulder it came out of the opposite 
flank, near the thigh, a yard of steel through 
the great body. Rearing, the lion struck 
the man, bearing down the shield, his back 
arched; and for a moment he slaked his 
fury with fang and talon. But on the in¬ 
stant I saw another spear driven clear 
through his body from side to side; and 
as the lion turned again the bright spear 
blades darting toward him were flashes of 
white flame. The end had come. He 
seized another man, who stabbed him and 
wrenched loose. As he fell he gripped a 
spear head in his jaws with such tremen¬ 
dous force that he bent it double. Then 
the warriors were round and over him, 
stabbing and shouting, wild with furious 
exultation. 
From the moment when he charged until 
his death I doubt whether ten seconds had 
elapsed, perhaps less; but what a ten 
