Seriously,
However, My Continued Ill-Luck Was Most Exasperating;
And The Result Was That The Indians Were
More Than Ever Confirmed In Their Belief That The
Lions Were Really Evil Spirits, Proof Against Mortal
Weapons.
Certainly, they did seem to bear
charmed lives.
After this dismal failure there was, of course,
nothing to do but to return to camp. Before doing
so, however, I proceeded to view the dead donkey,
which I found to have been only slightly devoured
it the quarters. It is a curious fact that lions
always begin at the tail of their prey and eat
upwards towards the head. As their meal had
thus been interrupted evidently at the very
beginning, I felt pretty sure that one or other
of the brutes would return to the carcase at
nightfall. Accordingly, as there was no tree of
any kind close at hand, I had a staging erected
some ten feet away from the body. This machan
was about twelve feet high and was composed
of four poles stuck into the ground and inclined
towards each other at the top, where a plank
was lashed to serve as a seat. Further, as the
nights were still pitch dark, I had the donkey's
carcase secured by strong wires to a neighbouring
stump, so that the lions might not be able to drag
it away before I could get a shot at them.
At sundown, therefore, I took up my position
on my airy perch, and much to the disgust of my
gun-bearer, Mahina, I decided to go alone.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 67 of 247
Words from 18544 to 18803
of 68125
