intimation of impending danger was the thunderous and triumphant
roar which the charging lion could no longer suppress.

Scarce pausing for a backward glance, Taglat abandoned the unconscious
woman and fled in the opposite direction from the horrid sound
which had broken in so unexpected and terrifying a manner upon his
startled ears; but the warning had come too late to save him, and
the lion, in his second bound, alighted full upon the broad shoulders
of the anthropoid.

As the great bull went down there was awakened in him to the full
all the cunning, all the ferocity, all the physical prowess which
obey the mightiest of the fundamental laws of nature, the law of
self-preservation, and turning upon his back he closed with the
carnivore in a death struggle so fearless and abandoned, that for
a moment the great Numa himself may have trembled for the outcome.

Seizing the lion by the mane, Taglat buried his yellowed fangs deep
in the monster's throat, growling hideously through the muffled
gag of blood and hair. Mixed with the ape's voice the lion's roars
of rage and pain reverberated through the jungle, till the lesser
creatures of the wild, startled from their peaceful pursuits,
scurried fearfully away.

Rolling over and over upon the turf the two battled with demoniac
fury, until the colossal cat, by doubling his hind paws far up
beneath his belly sank his talons deep into Taglat's chest, then,
ripping downward with all his strength, Numa accomplished his design,
and the disemboweled anthropoid, with a last spasmodic struggle,
relaxed in limp and bloody dissolution beneath his titanic adversary.