n who had fled up the tree claimed the lion's
skin, on the score that he had drawn first blood.

About fifteen miles away from one of our camps was that of the Barbers
and Cummings, old Kaffrarian friends of mine. I once walked over to see
them. A sort of kraal-fence of horns around their encampment was
evidence of the splendid sport they had enjoyed. Mr. Hilton Barber had
had a narrow escape a few days previously. When on horseback he had
been charged by a wounded buffalo. Mr. Barber was flung off. His horse
was killed, but the buffalo fell to a well-directed bullet fired from
the fallen rider while the poor horse was still impaled on the cruel
horns.

The Barber party had encountered few, if any, lions up to the time of
my visit. A few days afterwards, however, a remarkable thing occurred.
The encampment being outside the tsetse fly area, the party had brought
both cattle and horses with them. One day all the hunters were away on
horseback. The oxen, in charge of a native herd, were grazing hi the
immediate vicinity of the wagons. In the middle of the forenoon a troop
of lions came up openly and deliberately, and attacked the cattle,
killing several. One or two were pulled down on the very edge of the
camp. This was an almost unprecedented occurrence.

One very important incident of my visit was the gift to me of a pair of
boots by Mr. Hilton Barber. I had, for weeks previously, been using
sandals of buffalo hide, and my feet used to get terribly scarred by
thorns. I shall never forget the comfort of that pair of boots.

Our camp, some ten miles to the westward of Ship Mountain, was almost
on the edge of a donga, with sheer sides about ten feet deep. At the
bottom was a water-hole the only one within a radius of many miles. On
pitch-dark nights the lions would often come up this donga to drink. It
was eerie, indeed, to lie in the flimsy tent listening to the growls
and gulps of the great brutes within less than ten yards of where we
lay. I often tried to muster up courage to light a flare, creep to the
edge of the donga, and try a shot. By daylight the idea seemed feasible
enough, and not very dangerous. But I never got so far as to translate
this idea into action. There is, I think, nothing so calculated to
imbue one with a sense of personal insignificance as the knowledge, on
a dark night, that lions are in one's immediate vicinity.

Leaving the brazen toned roar, which is but seldom heard, out of the
question,