OCR Rendition - approximate

CHAP. IT J   A!!'EMPT AT REVENGE.   2q

other lions gave over their pursuit after a few paces. We next followed the mule tracks until they lay sufficiently clear of one another for us to count them, and see whether any more besides the two animals we had seen were dead. I was delighted to find nine tracks, so that not only the six mules, that had drawn the cart, and the little horse were safe, but also the two remaining cart mules which had been left on the road had found out their fellows during the night, and joined them. I sent Timboo and another man to fetch them back, and the rest of us returned to cut off as much meat from the mule and the horse as we could eat or carry, for we were now without any animal food. We then climbed up the cliff that overhung the place where the mule lay, to hide it out of the way of the hyenas and jackals, until we were going back to the waggons.

We hunted about the whole day after the lions, but their spoors were lost among the rocks, and we could not see one of them. Andersson and I, therefore, determined to sit up and watch for them, as they were sure to return to the carcases in the night. There were two spots where we might lie in wait ; the one a camelthorn tree, about fifty yards from the mule, but with a most difficult trunk to climb, so thick and straight, that ropes would be necessary; the other, a ledge in the rock, at the very spot where we had been hiding the meat. The cliff rose abruptly above us,-a man could easily climb it; but we agreed, in our innocence, that a lion could not. So, when the strayed mules and horses had been recovered in safety, we went to the cart, had our dinner, and brought down our warm coats and spare guns, as the evening closed in. Stewartson, with two or three hands, came with us to carry back the horse-meat. It became rapidly twilight as the sun set behind the crags, throwing the deep gorge of the Swakop into shadow ; and there was no time to be lost in getting down the meat and in choosing our positions, for the lions were due at nightfall. We walked quickly to the dead mule, and as we went, the men pointed out five or six deer, or something like them, that we could not clearly see, bounding along the rocks above us and parallel to us. We came to the place ; the mule lay as we had left her. Andersson had gone to the other side of the river to reconnoitre something, and I left my guns, etc., at the bottom of the rock with Stewartson and the men, and ran up to fetch the meat. I was busy tugging out the last shoulder of my trusty steed, when the men called out, " Good God, sir, the lion's above you 1 " I did feel queer, but I did not drop the joint. I walked steadily

4