before any one could prevent him, made a
bold dash into the jungle at a point where the hounds were clamouring
loudest.

"Save us a', the body's gane gyte!" exclaimed Sandy Black, promptly
following. "Come on, freen's, or he's a deed man."

Sandy's impulse was suddenly arrested by a roar from the lion so
tremendous that it appeared to shake the solid earth. Next moment Jerry
beheld a large animal bound with a crash through the brake straight at
him. His heart leaped into his mouth, but he retained sufficient
vitality to present and fire. A wild yell followed, as the animal fell
dead at his feet, and Jerry found that he had lodged the whole
collection of buttons, nails, and miscellaneous articles, along with the
tea-spoon, in the head of the best hound, which had been scared by the
monarch's appalling roar!

It is difficult to say whether laughter or indignant growls were loudest
on the occurrence of this, but it is certain that the brothers Rennie
entered the thicket immediately after, despite the almost angry
remonstrances of the more knowing men, advanced to within about fifteen
paces of the spot where the lion lay crouched among the gnarled roots of
an evergreen bush with a small space of open ground on one side of it.

"Now then, boys," said George Rennie, casting a hasty glance over his
shoulder at the mulatto supports, "steady, and take good aim after we
fire."

He put the elephant gun to his shoulder as he spoke, his brother and
comrade did the same; a triple report followed, and the three heavy
balls, aimed with deadly precision, struck a great block of red stone
behind which the lion was lying.

With a furious growl he shot from his lair like the bolt from a
cross-bow. The mulattos instinctively turned and fled without firing a
shot. The three champions, with empty guns, tumbled over each other in
eager haste to escape the dreaded claws--but in vain, for with one
stroke he dashed John Rennie to the ground, put his paw on him, and
looked round with that dignified air of grandeur which has doubtless
earned for his race the royal title. The scene was at once magnificent,
thrilling, and ludicrous. It was impossible for the other hunters to
fire, because while one man was under the lion's paw the others were
scrambling towards them in such a way as to render an aim impossible.

After gazing at them steadily for a few seconds the lion turned as if in
sovereign contempt, scattered the hounds like a pa