ood his ground with arched back and
snarling face, for all the world like a great, spotted tabby.

Numa had not felt like fighting; but the sight of Sheeta daring
to dispute his rights kindled his ferocious brain to sudden fire.
His rounded eyes glared with rage, his undulating tail snapped to
stiff erectness as, with a frightful roar, he charged this presuming
vassal.

It came so suddenly and from so short a distance that Sheeta had
no chance to turn and flee the rush, and so he met it with raking
talons and snapping jaws; but the odds were all against him. To
the larger fangs and the more powerful jaws of his adversary were
added huge talons and the preponderance of the lion's great weight.
At the first clash Sheeta was crushed and, though he deliberately
fell upon his back and drew up his powerful hind legs beneath Numa
with the intention of disemboweling him, the lion forestalled him
and at the same time closed his awful jaws upon Sheeta's throat.

It was soon over. Numa rose, shaking himself, and stood above the
torn and mutilated body of his foe. His own sleek coat was cut and
the red blood trickled down his flank; though it was but a minor
injury, it angered him. He glared down at the dead panther and
then, in a fit of rage, he seized and mauled the body only to drop
it in a moment, lower his head, voice a single terrific roar, and
turn toward the ape-man.

Approaching the still form he sniffed it over from head to foot.
Then he placed a huge paw upon it and turned it over with its face
up. Again he smelled about the body and at last with his rough tongue
licked Tarzan's face. It was then that Tarzan opened his eyes.

Above him towered the huge lion, its hot breath upon his face, its
rough tongue upon his cheek. The ape-man had often been close to
death; but never before so close as this, he thought, for he was
convinced that death was but a matter of seconds. His brain was
still numb from the effects of the blow that had felled him, and
so he did not, for a moment, recognize the lion that stood over
him as the one he had so recently encountered.

Presently, however, recognition dawned upon him and with it
a realization of the astounding fact that Numa did not seem bent
on devouring him--at least not immediately. His position was a
delicate one. The lion stood astraddle Tarzan with his front paws.
The ape-man could not rise, therefore, without pushing the lion away
and whether Numa would tolerate being pu