cut off their retreat, the
excitement of the rough and bumpy ride being intensified a hundred-fold
by the probability of our driving slap into the pair on rounding the
rise. On getting to the other side, however, they were nowhere to be
seen, so we drove on as hard as we could to the top, whence we caught
sight of them about four hundred yards away. As there seemed to be no
prospect of getting nearer we decided to open fire at this range, and
at the third shot the lioness tumbled over to my .303. At first I
thought I had done for her, as for a few minutes she lay on the ground
kicking and struggling; but in the end, although evidently badly hit,
she rose to her feet and followed the lion, who had escaped uninjured,
into some long grass from which we could not hope to dislodge them.

As it was now late in the afternoon, and as there seemed no possibility
of inducing the lions to leave the thicket in which they had concealed
themselves, we turned back towards camp, intending to come out again
the next day to track the wounded lioness. I was now riding "Blazeaway"
and was trotting along in advance of the tonga, when suddenly he shied
badly at a hyena, which sprang up out of the grass almost from beneath
his feet and quickly scampered off. I pulled up for a moment and sat
watching the hyena's ungainly bounds, wondering whether he were worth a
shot. Suddenly I felt "Blazeaway" trembling violently beneath me, and
on looking over my left shoulder to discover the reason, I was startled
to see two fine lions not more than a hundred yards away, evidently the
pair which I had seen the day before and which we had really come in
search of. They looked as if they meant to dispute our passage, for
they came slowly towards me for about ten yards or so and then lay
down, watching me steadily all the time. I called out to Spooner, "Here
are the lions I told you about," and he whipped up the ponies and in a
moment or two was beside me with the tonga.

By this time I had seized my .303 and dismounted, so we at once
commenced a cautious advance on the crouching lions, the arrangement
being that Spooner was to take the right-hand one and I the other. We
had got to within sixty yards' range without incident and were just
about to sit down comfortably to "pot" them, when they suddenly
surprised us by turning and bolting off. I managed, however, to put a
bullet into the one I had marked just as he crested a bank, and he
looked very grand as h