ig central camp-fire and
a wonderful display of pagan hilarity.

It had been a hard day. Fourteen hours without food, several hours
without water, and miles of hard tramping through thorn scrub in the
darkness and of long, broiling stretches in the blazing sunlight. It
seemed a good price to pay even for a lion, but that night, as I finally
stretched out on my cot, I was conscious from time to time of a glow of
pleasure that swept over me. It seemed that of all human gratifications
there was none equal to that experienced by the man who has killed his
first lion.

My second lion experience came three days later. With a couple of tents
and about forty porters our party of four had marched across to a point
a couple of miles from where I had killed the lion. We hoped to put in a
day or two looking for lions, some of which had been reported in that
district. The porters went on ahead with the camp equipment, while we
came along more slowly. Mr. Akeley had taken some close-range
photographs of rhinos, and we were just on the point of starting direct
for the new camp when we ran across two enormous rhinos standing in the
open plain. One was extremely large, with an excellent pair of horns,
and it was arranged that I should try to secure this one as a trophy,
while Mr. Akeley secured a photograph of the event. At thirty-five yards
I shot the larger one of the two, and it dropped in its tracks. The
other started to charge, but was finally driven away by shouting and by
shots fired in the air. The photograph was excellent and quite dramatic.

For an hour the gunbearers worked on the dead rhino and finally secured
the head and feet and certain desirable parts of the skin. At noon we
resumed our march for camp, two or three miles away. We had hardly gone
half the distance when one of the tent boys was seen far ahead, riding
the one mule that we had dared to bring down the Tana River. It was
evident that something important had occurred and we hurried on to meet
him.

"_Simba!_" he shouted, as soon as he could be heard. In a moment we had
the details. One of the saises had seen two lions, a large male and
female, quite near the camp. Porters were instructed to watch the beasts
until we should arrive, and now were supposed to be in touch with them.
We omitted luncheon and struck off at once in the direction indicated by
the tent boy. We soon came up to the porters and an instant later saw
the lions. It was a beautiful sight. Th