In the end of 1891 I shot a very large lion at Hartley Hills in Mashonaland, and weighed and measured it carefully, as it was killed within three hundred yards of the settlement. This animal, which was a remarkably fine specimen of a wild lion, was in excellent condition, its whole belly being covered with a layer of fat quite half an inch in thickness; it was also a very large animal, as its measurements will show, and I was much surprised to find that its weight was not greater than it proved to be. As the scale on which I weighed it only registered a weight of 220 lbs., I had to skin and cut the lion up, and weigh him by instalments, and the aggregate of the weights was 408 lbs. As a good deal of blood was lost when his head was cut off, I will add two pounds to this figure, and say that this lion’s dead weight was not less than 410 lbs. I was much disappointed with this lion, as I expected him to weigh 500 lbs. He was an old animal, and might have weighed more when he was a few years younger, as in spite of being fat and well fed, I don’t think his quarters were so rounded and muscular as they might have been. The measurements of his skull—which is now in the collection of the Natural History Museum at South Kensington—are identical with those of the skull of the largest lion shot by Colonel Arthur Paget in Somaliland, as given in Mr. Ward’s book of game measurements; the weight of the skull is 5½ lbs., or ½ lb. in excess of the weight of the very large skull of a lion shot by Mr. Geddes in Eastern Africa, the measurements of which are recorded in the same book. I took the extreme length and the standing height of this lion very carefully; taking the distance with a tape line between pegs driven in firstly at the point of the nose and the tip of the tail, and secondly at the top of the shoulder-blade and the ball of the forefoot, the limb being held straight the while. These measurements give his extreme length in a straight line as he lay dead as 9 ft. 11 ins., and his vertical standing height to the top of the shoulder-blade as 3 ft. 8 ins. The height to the top of the mane, however, with which his shoulders were thickly covered and which was his apparent standing height, was exactly 4 ft. When the skin of this lion was pegged out on the ground it measured 11 ft. 9 ins. in extreme length from nose to tip of tail.
The last lion which I shot, on October 3, 1892, near the Pungwe river in South-Eastern Africa, was a very thick-set, massive animal, and enormously fat. He would, I think, have weighed very heavy, but unfortunately I had no scale with me. I took a few careful measurements, however, which are as follows: Length as he lay in a straight line between pegs driven into the ground at the nose and tip of the tail, 9 ft. 1 in.; vertical standing height at shoulder, 3 ft. 4 ins.; girth of body behind the shoulders, 4 ft. 0½ ins.; girth of forearm, 17 ins.; length of pegged-out skin exactly 11 ft. If any conclusion can be drawn from these few statistics, it is I think that a lion which weighs much over 400 lbs. is an exceptionally heavy animal.
One of the most striking characteristics of the lion is his roar, for there is no more magnificent sound in Nature than the volume of sound produced by a party of lions roaring in unison, that is, if one is fortunate enough to be very near to them. It is, however, a rare occurrence to hear lions roar loudly within a short distance of one’s camp, and in all my experience, though I have heard these animals roaring upon hundreds of different occasions, I can count the nights on the fingers of one hand when, all unconscious of my near vicinity, a party of several lions has roared freely within 100 yards of where I was lying. Last year, whilst hunting with two companions in the neighbourhood of the Pungwe river, I don’t think a single night passed during the six weeks we remained in that part of the country that we did not hear lions, and sometimes three different parties of these animals were roaring round our camp at the same time. But on no single occasion were they ever within a mile of where we were sleeping, and as there are probably few parts of Africa where lions are more plentiful than in this particular district, I think it is quite possible to have had a very considerable experience of African travel and yet never to have heard lions roaring freely at very close quarters. If ever experienced, such a serenade can never be forgotten, for it is at once magnificent yet calculated to fill the soul with awe.
It is a fact I think which admits of no dispute that lions only roar freely in countries where they have not been much disturbed, and where they are practically the masters of the situation, and as soon as a district in which these animals exist is much hunted over, they become comparatively silent. Thus, although lions are still fairly numerous in the neighbourhood of the outlying mining camps in Mashonaland, where they continually make their presence disagreeably felt by killing the donkeys, oxen and horses of the prospectors, they are seldom heard to roar at nights, and I have noticed this same peculiarity in other newly settled districts. Loud roaring is usually, I think, a sign of happiness and contentment, and is indulged in very often when on the way down to drink, after a good meal. Naturally, when hungry and on the look out for their prey, lions do not roar, but remain perfectly silent, and when they attack one’s camp at night, the first intimation received of their presence will be given by the cries and struggles of the animal they seize. When standing at bay lions do not roar, but keep up a continuous loud hoarse growling, which can be heard at a considerable distance.
It has always appeared to me that lions succumb more quickly to wounds in the front part of the body, in the neighbourhood of the heart and lungs, than do any of the antelopes living in the same country; but, as with all other animals, shots through the stomach, intestines, or hind-quarters do them little immediate harm, unless indeed the back or leg bones are injured, when they are at once disabled. Although, as I have said earlier in this chapter, lions almost always retreat before the presence of man, they become very savage when wounded, and it is undoubtedly highly dangerous work following them into long grass or thick cover without dogs. My experience in Southern Africa has shown me that wounded lions are far more likely to charge than wounded buffaloes, and although they may be more easily stopped, they are much quicker and more difficult to hit than those animals.
I have only shot lions with two kinds of rifles, a single 10-bore carrying a spherical bullet and six drachms of powder, and a .450-bore Metford rifle by George Gibbs of Bristol, carrying either a 360-grain expanding bullet and ninety grains of powder, or a 540-grain solid bullet and seventy-five grains of powder; and in my opinion the .450-bore with the heavy 360-grain expanding bullet was the more deadly weapon. These expanding bullets, having but a very small hole at the point and a good solid base, possess great penetrating power, as may be believed when I say that they will reach the brain of a hippopotamus, should they enter at the side of the head between the ear and the eye. They will go clean through a lion behind the shoulders, after first making a very large hole through his lungs; and if the animal be struck in the shoulder, the bones will be smashed and the solid end of the bullet will go right through the cavity of the chest, probably piercing the heart, and lodge in the further shoulder. I think that the effectiveness of a rifle depends more on the bullet it carries than on its bore, and should consider a .450-bore rifle such as I have described carrying a 360-grain expanding bullet, with only a small hollow and a good solid end, a more trustworthy weapon than a rifle of a much larger bore carrying a short light bullet with a very large hollow. Doubtless a good .577-bore rifle is a much more powerful weapon than any .450; but the latter if carrying a good heavy bullet will be found very effective for lion shooting, and is not only lighter and handier than the larger rifle, but has no recoil, as the charge of powder is comparatively small.
I will now conclude this chapter by giving an account of the death of the largest lion that it has been my fortune to bag—the same animal whose weight and dimensions I have given on p. 329.
Towards the end of the second year of the occupation of Mashonaland by the British South Africa Company, I was sent to some of the mining camps to the north and west of Salisbury, in order to make a report upon the roads in those districts. On December 8, 1891, I reached Hartley Hills, one of the outlying stations of the British South Africa Company, where, at the time of my visit, there were about twenty Europeans living, most of whom were employed in mining work. Among the company’s officials were Mr. Woodthorpe Graham, the gold commissioner and chief magistrate of the district, and Dr. Edgelow, the district surgeon. For some days previous to my arrival at the station, the weather had been very rainy, and the sky dull and cloudy. Hartley Hills are, I may here say, two small ‘kopjes,’ formed of granite boulders piled up one upon another to a height of perhaps 100 feet above the surrounding country. On one of these hills stood the stores and dwelling houses of Frank Johnson & Co., while the Gold Commissioner and the Doctor occupied the other; and it was at the foot of the latter hill that I outspanned my waggon at a distance of not more than twenty yards from Mr. Graham’s compound. As I knew that a great deal of damage had been done lately by one particular lion, which had been seen on several occasions, and which was always described as a very large animal with a fine mane, I was in hopes that he might still be about, and thought that if he would only be good enough to pay a visit to the settlement whilst I was there, I might get a good chance of shooting him, as the wet weather, I imagined, would make the ground sufficiently soft to enable me to track him. Not content with killing oxen and donkeys at some little distance from the settlement, this lion had one night so frightened two valuable horses belonging to Mr. Frank Johnson that they had rushed at the door of their stable, and breaking the thongs with which it was secured, broken out, and run up the hill, where they were both killed within a few yards of a dwelling hut usually occupied by Mr. Johnson, who was, however, absent at the time. The carcase of the one horse was left entirely untouched, I was informed, the animal having been killed by a bite at the back of the head, the lion making his meal off his other victim, which was possibly in better condition.
My first question after my arrival at Hartley Hills was as to whether this lion was still in the district, and I was much disappointed to learn that nothing had been heard of him lately. I found my old friend Mr. Graham just packing up for a three days’ trip into the country to the west of the Umfuli river, where some rich gold reefs had been discovered, on which he was anxious to report. That evening I had dinner with Dr. Edgelow, and a long chat afterwards, and as, when it was time to turn in, a drizzly rain was falling, I resolved to take possession of Mr. Graham’s hut for the night, instead of going down to my waggon. As it wanted about three days to full moon, it would have been a bright moonlight night had the weather been fine, but as it was the sky was thickly overcast with clouds. Before quitting Dr. Edgelow I remarked to him what a beautiful night it was for a lion, regarded, of course, from a lion’s point of view, as these animals are always most dangerous on dark, rainy nights. My waggon, as I have said before, was standing just at the foot of the rocks, the oxen being tied two and two in the yokes; but besides the working cattle I had a spare animal that always lay loose at no great distance from the others. My old shooting horse was tied to the forewheel of the waggon, on the side nearest to the hill, whilst my old servant and waggon-driver, John, and two Kafirs, were sleeping under a shelter which they had made on the other side of the waggon.
I had sat up till a late hour talking with Dr. Edgelow, and when I at last went to bed in Mr. Graham’s hut the camp was perfectly quiet, everyone being fast asleep, an example which I was not long in following. I must have slept for some hours when I was suddenly awakened by the discharge of a rifle. Being inside the hut I awoke without any distinct idea of the direction in which the shot had been fired; but the first report was quickly followed by a second which I knew must have been fired from my waggon. Jumping up I at once made for the door of the hut and opened it just as a third shot was fired. ‘What’s the matter?’I called out in Dutch to John. ‘It’s a lion, sir; he has killed the loose ox,’ he answered, and again fired. This time the shot was answered by a low hoarse growl, the bullet, I suppose, having passed very close to the marauder. I was soon down at the waggon alongside of John, but nothing was to be either seen or heard. The rain had ceased, but as the moon was now down, and it was very cloudy, the darkness was intense, and it was evident that nothing could be done till daylight. John felt sure the ox was dead, as he had heard it make a short rush and fall heavily twice, after which all was still, and as we could now hear nothing, we both thought the lion had been scared away from the carcase by the last shot. It is worthy of remark that, although this ox was seized and killed by a lion within thirty yards of fourteen other oxen that were tied to the yokes, not one of them evinced the slightest alarm, and the greater part of them lay quietly chewing the cud till daylight, undisturbed either by the near proximity of the lion or by the shots fired by John. I suppose the lion had come up below the wind, and never having scented him, they did not realise what had happened. My old horse, however, which was always very nervous and fidgetty in the presence of lions, seemed fully aware of what had occurred, as with ears pricked forwards, and looking in the direction whence the low hoarse growl of the lion had proceeded, he kept shifting his feet uneasily, every now and again snorting loudly.