et of his sudden disappearance
would be only too obvious to their practised eyes. His time had come.

Suddenly a terrific series of roars and snarlings broke forth above.
With it mingled volleys of excited exclamations in the Zulu voice, then
the Usutu war-shout. The clamour became terrific. The ground above
seemed to shake with it. With each outbreak of roaring, the war-shout
would rise in deafening volume--then snarling and hissing, but the
sounds would seem to be moving about from place to place. Then arose a
mighty shout of triumphant cadence and the roaring was heard no more--
instead a hubbub of excited voices, and then Wyvern, partly owing to the
tensity of his recent trial, partly owing to sheer exhaustion, subsided
into a temporary unconsciousness.

This is what had happened above. The lion-cub which had run across
Wyvern's path had strayed from its parent. The latter, with another
cub, bounded forward just as the foremost of the pursuing Zulus arrived
upon the scene. She sprang like lightning upon the first, crushing his
head to fragments in her powerful jaws, and that with such suddenness as
to leave him no time to use a weapon. Another, rushing to the rescue,
shared the same fate, and then the whole lot came up. There were under
a dozen, but they were all young men, and full of warrior courage; yet,
even for them, to kill a full-grown lioness--and this one was out of the
ordinary large and powerful, and fighting for her cubs to boot--with
nothing but assegais and sticks, was a very big feat indeed, and
appealed to their sporting instincts far more than continuing the
pursuit of one unarmed white man. So with loud shouts they entered into
the fray, leaping hither and thither with incredible agility so as to
puzzle the infuriated beast, the while delivering a deft throw with the
lighter or casting assegai. Another received fatal injuries, and two
were badly torn, then one, with consummate daring, watching his
opportunity, rushed in and drove his broad-bladed assegai right into the
beast's heart; and that one was Mtezani, the son of Majendwa.

A roar of applause and delight arose from the few left. _Auf_ the son
of Majendwa was a man indeed--they chorused. Surely the trophies of the
lioness were his. The throws of their light assegai were as pin-pricks.
It was the _umkonto_ of the son of Majendwa that had cleft the heart.
And then they started a stirring dance and song around their slain
enemy.