lion been let alone, he would have
gone entirely away without molesting us. But was he not let alone. My
companion was a bold, rash man--too bold and too rash upon that
occasion. It occurred to him that the enemy was moving off too slowly;
and fancying, in his foolish way, that a shot from "Queen Anne" might
intimidate the brute and quicken his pace, he rested the piece upon one
of the old leaf-marks of the tree, and, taking steady aim, banged away.

Likely enough the shot hit the lion--for he was not yet fifty yards from
the muzzle of the gun--but what effect could a load of snipe-shot
produce upon the thick hide of an enormous brute like that?

In the lion's mind, however, it produced the very opposite effect to
what my companion anticipated, for it neither caused him to run away or
even quicken his pace, nor yet frightened him any way. On the contrary,
almost simultaneously with the report, he uttered a loud scream, and,
turning in his track, came bounding towards the tree!

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

No doubt in less than another minute Ben Brace and I would have ceased
to live. I had made up my mind that both of us would be torn to
pieces--and certainly this would have been the result had my companion
not been a man of ready resources. But fortunately, he was so, and at
that crisis conceived a means of escape from the danger that threatened
us. Perhaps he had thought of it before. It is most probable he had,
otherwise he would scarce have acted so imprudently as he had done--for
nothing could have been more imprudent than firing at a lion upon an
open plain with nothing but snipe-shot in the gun!

It is likely, however, that Ben had though of his means of retreat
before firing that shot, though what they were I could not imagine. We
were upon the ground, with the thick trunk of a tree between us and the
lion; but of course, that would be no protection since the beast saw us,
and would soon come round to our side. How then were we to retreat?
For my part I believed we should both be killed and devoured.

Ben was of a different opinion, and before I could do more than give
utterance to an exclamation of terror, he had caught me by the legs and
hoisted me high above his shoulders into the air!

"Now, lad," shouted he, "lay hold of the branch and hoist yourself up.
Quick!--quick! or the beast'll be on us."

I at once divined his intention; and, without waiting to make reply, I
seized one of the branche