nesses, full grown, and four young lions as large and
quite as formidable as their parents. Tarzan halted, growling, and the
lions paused, the great male in the lead baring his fangs and rumbling
forth a warning roar. In his hand the ape-man held his heavy spear;
but he had no intention of pitting his puny weapon against seven lions;
yet he stood there growling and roaring and the lions did likewise. It
was purely an exhibition of jungle bluff. Each was trying to frighten
off the other. Neither wished to turn back and give way, nor did
either at first desire to precipitate an encounter. The lions were fed
sufficiently so as not to be goaded by pangs of hunger and as for
Tarzan he seldom ate the meat of the carnivores; but a point of ethics
was at stake and neither side wished to back down. So they stood there
facing one another, making all sorts of hideous noises the while they
hurled jungle invective back and forth. How long this bloodless duel
would have persisted it is difficult to say, though eventually Tarzan
would have been forced to yield to superior numbers.

There came, however, an interruption which put an end to the deadlock
and it came from Tarzan's rear. He and the lions had been making so
much noise that neither could hear anything above their concerted
bedlam, and so it was that Tarzan did not hear the great bulk bearing
down upon him from behind until an instant before it was upon him, and
then he turned to see Buto, the rhinoceros, his little, pig eyes
blazing, charging madly toward him and already so close that escape
seemed impossible; yet so perfectly were mind and muscles coordinated
in this unspoiled, primitive man that almost simultaneously with the
sense perception of the threatened danger he wheeled and hurled his
spear at Buto's chest. It was a heavy spear shod with iron, and behind
it were the giant muscles of the ape-man, while coming to meet it was
the enormous weight of Buto and the momentum of his rapid rush. All
that happened in the instant that Tarzan turned to meet the charge of
the irascible rhinoceros might take long to tell, and yet would have
taxed the swiftest lens to record. As his spear left his hand the
ape-man was looking down upon the mighty horn lowered to toss him, so
close was Buto to him. The spear entered the rhinoceros' neck at its
junction with the left shoulder and passed almost entirely through the
beast's body, and at the instant that he launched it, Tarz