On Another Occasion
One Of Our Party Was Lying Sound Asleep And Unconscious Of Danger
Between Two Natives Behind A
Bush at Mashue; the fire was nearly out
at their feet in consequence of all being completely tired out
by
The fatigues of the previous day; a lion came up to within three yards
of the fire, and there commenced roaring instead of making a spring:
the fact of their riding-ox being tied to the bush was the only reason
the lion had for not following his instinct, and making a meal of flesh.
He then stood on a knoll three hundred yards distant, and roared all night,
and continued his growling as the party moved off by daylight next morning.
Nothing that I ever learned of the lion would lead me to attribute to it
either the ferocious or noble character ascribed to it elsewhere.
It possesses none of the nobility of the Newfoundland or St. Bernard dogs.
With respect to its great strength there can be no doubt.
The immense masses of muscle around its jaws, shoulders, and forearms
proclaim tremendous force. They would seem, however, to be inferior in power
to those of the Indian tiger. Most of those feats of strength
that I have seen performed by lions, such as the taking away of an ox,
were not carrying, but dragging or trailing the carcass along the ground:
they have sprung on some occasions on to the hind-quarters of a horse,
but no one has ever seen them on the withers of a giraffe.
They do not mount on the hind-quarters of an eland even,
but try to tear him down with their claws.
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