On the 22nd, after a march of four hours and a half, we came to the
beautiful stream of Mtambu - the water of which was sweet, and clear
as crystal, and flowed northward. We saw for the first time the
home of the lion and the leopard. Hear what Freiligrath says of
the place:
Where the thorny brake and thicket
Densely fill the interspace
Of the trees, through whose thick branches
Never sunshine lights the place,
There the lion dwells, a monarch,
Mightiest among the brutes;
There his right to reign supremest
Never one his claim disputes.
There he layeth down to slumber,
Having slain and ta'en his fill;
There he roameth, there be croucheth,
As it suits his lordly will.
We camped but a few yards from just such a place as the poet
describes. The herd-keeper who attended the goats and donkeys,
soon after our arrival in camp, drove the animals to water, and
in order to obtain it they travelled through a tunnel in the brake,
caused by elephants and rhinoceros. They had barely entered the
dark cavernous passage, when a black-spotted leopard sprang, and
fastened its fangs in the neck of one of the donkeys, causing it,
from the pain, to bray hideously.
