ON SAFARI IN SOTIK WILDERNESS AND LAKE NAIVASHA 423 
to delight when he saw Roosevelt take quick but steady aim and pull 
the trigger and beheld the great beast flop back in the water, killed 
by the close shot. He described it as a thrillingly sportsmanlike act. 
The situation of the camp was one not unattended with danger, 
the route round the lake being infested by lions. Three of these 
brutes had chased the correspondent on his ride. But a more exciting 
experience was that of Leslie A. Tarleton, a citizen of Naivasha, who 
had gone with the party to the Sotik district as a scout and left it 
on July 19 to return home. Riding on horseback across the plain, 
to his alarm he found no less than five lions on his path, “big, black¬ 
maned man-eaters/' as he described them. They kept close on his 
track, now skulking away when in the open, now closing in on him 
when bush began again, and more than once seeming near enough 
to spring on the lone rider. The frightened horse made all the 
speed it could from the chase of these dangerous brutes, but the rider 
was glad enough when the town came within view and the man-eaters 
skulked in disappointment away. 
It was while at Captain Attenborough's ranch that Roosevelt 
had the threatening experience spoken of on page 23, when he was 
attacked in his boat by a herd of hippopotami and endangered by the 
panic of his native attendants, and when only his quick use of the 
rifle saved his life. It was one of various occasions during his African 
journey in which nerve and quickness saved him from death. 
While at Naivasha Colonel Mearns, the physician of the expedi¬ 
tion, was sent for in haste to give the benefit of his experience to three 
natives, who had been attacked and severely mauled by a lion. The 
doctor rode forty miles for this purpose, but succeeded in saving only 
one of the lion's victims, the other two dying. 
After his stay at Captain Attenborough's ranch Roosevelt pro¬ 
ceeded to Njoro, the ranch of Lord Delamere, one of the game wardens 
of the protectorate, where he enjoyed a ten days' hunt. From 
there he returned to Nairobi in early August, with the intention of 
making a hunting excursion to Mount Kenya. In the latter place he 
and the party under his command proposed to spend six weeks, hoping 
to get a few more elephants as part of his game. The character of 
this region has been sufficiently described in Chapter XII, and as the 
