In general the lion seizes the animal he is attacking by the flank
near the hind leg, or by the throat below the jaw.
It is questionable
whether he ever attempts to seize an animal by the withers.
The flank is the most common point of attack, and that is the part
he begins to feast on first. The natives and lions are very similar
in their tastes in the selection of tit-bits: an eland may be seen
disemboweled by a lion so completely that he scarcely seems cut up at all.
The bowels and fatty parts form a full meal for even the largest lion.
The jackal comes sniffing about, and sometimes suffers for his temerity
by a stroke from the lion's paw laying him dead. When gorged,
the lion falls fast asleep, and is then easily dispatched.
Hunting a lion with dogs involves very little danger as compared
with hunting the Indian tiger, because the dogs bring him out of cover
and make him stand at bay, giving the hunter plenty of time
for a good deliberate shot.
Where game is abundant, there you may expect lions in proportionately
large numbers. They are never seen in herds, but six or eight,
probably one family, occasionally hunt together. One is in
much more danger of being run over when walking in the streets of London,
than he is of being devoured by lions in Africa, unless engaged
in hunting the animal. Indeed, nothing that I have seen or heard about lions
would constitute a barrier in the way of men of ordinary
courage and enterprise.
The same feeling which has induced the modern painter to caricature the lion,
has led the sentimentalist to consider the lion's roar the most terrific
of all earthly sounds. We hear of the "majestic roar of the king of beasts."
It is, indeed, well calculated to inspire fear if you hear it
in combination with the tremendously loud thunder of that country,
on a night so pitchy dark that every flash of the intensely vivid lightning
leaves you with the impression of stone-blindness, while the rain
pours down so fast that your fire goes out, leaving you without
the protection of even a tree, or the chance of your gun going off.
But when you are in a comfortable house or wagon, the case is very different,
and you hear the roar of the lion without any awe or alarm.
The silly ostrich makes a noise as loud, yet he never was feared by man.
To talk of the majestic roar of the lion is mere majestic twaddle.
On my mentioning this fact some years ago, the assertion was doubted,
so I have been careful ever since to inquire the opinions of Europeans,
who have heard both, if they could detect any difference between
the roar of a lion and that of an ostrich; the invariable answer was,
that they could not when the animal was at any distance.
The natives assert that they can detect a variation between
the commencement of the noise of each.
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