"Oh!" says she, "that depends. There is your talkative lion, your learned lion, your silent lion—"
"That is the sort that I've always seen," says I; "now and then a growl, but nothing beyond that."
Cousin E. E. began to laugh again, till she had to hold one hand to her side.
"Oh! cousin, paws, paws," says she; "you just kill me with laughing."
"Yes," says I, "I don't deny that lions have paws, but it was speech we were talking about, and that I do deny."
Cousin E. E. just shrieked out laughing, though for the life of me I couldn't tell what it was all about.
"Now, don't you understand me—honest now—don't you?" says she.
"Why, of course I do; only nothing could be more ridiculous than the idea of a great, big, magnificent wild beast, with a swinging walk, and a tuft on the end of his tail, being showed off at a dinner-table. I for one shouldn't have a mite of appetite with such a creature prowling round."
"My dear, dear cousin, I'm speaking of human lions."
"Human lions! I always thought the creatures were awfully inhuman," says I; "nothing but a jackal can be worse."