How I Found Livingstone Travels, Adventures And Discoveries In Central Africa Including Four Months Residence With Dr. Livingstone By Sir Henry M. Stanley
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But My
Surprise Was Great When I Cautiously Laid It Against The Tree,
And Then Directed Its Muzzle To The Spot Where I Had Seen Him
Stand.
Looking further away - to where the grass was thin and
scant - I saw the animal bound along at a great rate, and that
it was a lion:
The noble monarch of the forest was in full
flight! From that moment I ceased to regard him as the
"mightiest among the brutes;" or his roar as anything more
fearful in broad daylight than a sucking dove's.
The next day was also a halt, and unable to contain my longing
for the chase, where there used to be such a concourse of game
of all kinds, soon after morning coffee, and after despatching
a couple of men with presents to my friend Ma-manyara, of
ammonia-bottle memory, I sauntered out once more for the park.
Not five hundred yards from the camp, myself and men were suddenly
halted by hearing in our immediate vicinity, probably within
fifty yards or so, a chorus of roars, issuing from a triplet
of lions. Instinctively my fingers raised the two hammers, as
I expected a general onset on me; for though one lion might fly,
it was hardly credible that three should. While looking keenly
about I detected, within easy rifle-shot, a fine hartebeest,
trembling and cowering behind a tree, as if it expected the fangs
of the lion in its neck. Though it had its back turned to me, I
thought a bullet might plough its way to a vital part, and without
a moment's hesitation I aimed and fired.
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