THE SECOND LIONESS.


Now our luck changed most abruptly. We had been riding since early
morning over the wide plains. By and by we came to a wide, shallow,
flood-water course carpeted with lava boulders and scant, scattered
brush. Two of us took one side of it, and two the other. At this we were
just within hailing distance. The boys wandered down the middle.

Game was here very abundant, and in this broken country proved quite
approachable. I saw one Grant's gazelle head, in especial, that greatly
tempted me; but we were hunting lions, and other shooting was out of
place. Also the prospects for lions had brightened, for we were
continually seeing hyenas in packs of from three to six. They lay among
the stones, but galloped away at our approach. The game paid not the
slightest attention to these huge, skulking brutes. One passed within
twenty feet of a hartebeeste; the latter hardly glanced at him. As the
hyena is lazy as well as cowardly, and almost never does his killing, we
inferred a good meat supply to gather so many of them in one place. From
a tributary ravine we flushed nineteen!

Harold Hill was riding with me on the right bank. His quick eye caught a
glimpse of something beyond our companions on the left side. A glance
through the glasses showed me that it was a lion, just disappearing over
the hill. At once we turned our horses to cross. It was a heavy job. We
were naturally in a tremendous hurry; and the footing among those
boulders and rounded rocks was so vile that a very slow trot was the
best we could accomplish. And that was only by standing in our stirrups,
and holding up our horses' heads by main strength. We reached the