St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1893-04-22
CHAPTER III.

'In6 lions came DacR no more tnaI
night, and by the next morning my
nerves had got pretty straight again,
but was full of wrath when / thought
of all that / had gone through at the
hands, or rather noses, of those four
lions, and of the fate of my after OK, Kap-
tein. He was splendid OK, and was
very fond Of him. So wroth was that.
like fool, determined to go for the
whole family of them. It was worthy
of greenhorn out ON his first hunting
trip, but did it nevertheless.
Accordingly, after breakfast, having
rubbed some oil upon my leg, which
was very sore from the cubs tongue, /
took the driver, Tom, who did not half
like the job, and having armed myself
with an ordinary double number twelve
smoothbore, the first breechloader ever
had, started. I took the smoothbore
because it shot bullet very well, and
my experience has been that round
ball from smoothbore is quite as effect
i've against lion as an express bullet.
The lion is soft and not a difficult ami
NAL to finish if you hit him anywhere in
the body. A buck takes far more
killing.
ssWell, l started. and the first thing
set to work to do was to try to make out
whereabouts the brutes lay up for the
day. About three hundred yards from
the wagon was the crest of rise, COW
cred with single mi1nosa trees, dotted
about in q parkGke fashion, and beyond
this was stretch of open plain, run
ming down to dry pan, or water hole,
which covered about an acre of ground
and was densely clothed with reeds,
now In the sere and yellow leaf. From
the farther edge of this pan the ground
sloped up again to a great cleft or null
lah, which had been cut out by the ac-
ton of water and was pretty thickly
sprinkled with bush, among which grew
some large trees, forget of what sort.
'.It at once struck me that the dry pan
would be a likely place to find my friends
in, as there is nothing lion is fonder of
than lying up In reeds, through which
he can see things without being seen
himself. Accord;nglNi thither / went
and prospected. Before had got half
way round the pan found the remains
of blue vilderbeeste that had evidently
been killed within the last three or four
days and partially devoured by lions,
and from other indications about was
soon assured that If the family were not
In the pan that day they spent good
deal of their spare time there. But il
there the question was how to get them
out, for it was clearly impossible to
think of going in after them unless one
was quite determined tocommit suicide.
"Now there was strong wind blow
ing from the direction of the wagon
across the reedy pan toward the bush
clad kloof or donga, and this first gave
me the idea Of firing the reeds, which,
as think told you, were pretty dry.
Accordingly Tom took some matches
and began starting little fires to the left,
and ] did the same to the right. But
the reeds were still green at the bottom,
and we should never have got them well
alight had it not been for the wind,
which got stronger and stronger as the
sun got higher and forced the fire into
them. AT last, after half an hours
trouble, the fame got hold and began
to spread out like fan, whereupon
got around to the farther side of the
pan to wait for the lions, standing well
out in the open as we stood at the copse
today where you shot the woodcock.
ut was rather risky thing to do, but
| used to be SO sure of my shooting in
those days that did not SO much mind
the risk. Scarcely had I got round
when heard the reeds parting before
the onward rush of some animal. Now
for it, said /. On it came. could see
that it was yellow and prepared for ac-
ton, when, instead of a lion. out bound
ed beautiful reit-bok which had been
lying in the shelter Of the pan. 1t must.
by the way, have been reit-bok Of q
peculiarly confding nature to lay itself
down with the lion like the lamb of
prophecy, but suppose that the reeds
were thick and that it kept a long way
of.
well, I let the reit-bok 60, and it
went like the wind, and kept my eyes
fixed upon the reeds. The fire was burn
ing like furnace now, the flames crack
ling and roaring as they bit into the
reeds, sending spouts of fire twenty feet
and more into the air, and making the
hot air dance above it In a way that was
perfectly dazzling. But the reeds Were
still half green and created an enormous
quantity of smoke. which came rolling
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