The Tower Menagerie

by Edward Turner Bennett

THE CAPE LION.

Felis Leo.—Var. Capensis.

Africa, as we have already observed, is truly the native country of the Lion; and in no part of that vast continent, we may add, does he attain greater size, or exhibit all his characteristic features in fuller and more complete developement, than in the immediate vicinity of the settlements which have been formed in the interior of its southern extremity by the Dutch and English colonists of the Cape. In speaking of the Bengal Lion, we have also pointed out the more striking characteristics by which the Asiatic race is distinguished from that of Southern Africa; consisting principally in the larger size, the more regular and graceful form, the generally darker colour, and the less extensive mane of the African. It remains, however, to be mentioned that, even in this latter race, there are two varieties, which have been long known to the settlers under the names of the Pale and the Black Lion, distinguished, as their appellations imply, by the lighter or darker colour of their coats, and more particularly of their manes. This variation, there can be little doubt, is entirely produced by the different character of the districts which they inhabit, and of the food which they are enabled to procure. The black Lion, as he is termed, is the larger and the more ferocious of the two, more frequently attacking man himself, if less noble prey should fail him; and sometimes measuring the enormous distance of eight feet from the tip of the nose to the origin of the tail, which is generally about half the length of the body. He is, however, of less frequent occurrence than the pale variety.

It is in the night-time more particularly that the Lion prowls abroad in search of his prey, the conformation of his eyes not only, like those of the cat, allowing him to see with a very moderate degree of light, but even rendering the full glare of day distressing and intolerable to him. It is for this reason that travellers, who are compelled to sleep in the open air in countries infested by these animals, are careful to keep up a blazing fire, which the tenderness of their eyes deters them from approaching, unless when they are extremely hard pressed by the calls of hunger. These, it would appear, sometimes become paramount to every other consideration, and urge the Lion, as they do many more ignoble beasts, into the exhibition of a degree of courage, which, in despite of all that has been said on the subject, is by no means his natural characteristic.

“At the time,” says Mr. Burchell, in his admirable Travels in Southern Africa, “when men first adopted the Lion as the emblem of courage, it would seem that they regarded great size and strength as indicating it; but they were greatly mistaken in the character they had given of this indolent skulking animal.” That an animal which seldom attacks by open force, but, stealing along with cautious and noiseless tread, silently approaches his victim, conceals himself in treacherous ambush, and at length, when he imagines his prey to be fairly within his reach, bounds forth upon him with an overwhelming leap, crushes him beneath the tremendous weight of his irresistible paw, tears him piece-meal with his talons, and, after having surfeited on his horrid meal, returns into the depths of his solitary concealment to sleep away the hours until his satiated appetite shall be again renewed, and his craving maw stimulate him to fresh exertion,—that such an animal should ever have been regarded as the type of courage and the emblem of magnanimity would indeed be most astonishing, were it not that men have in all ages been too prone to flatter superior power, and to offer at the shrine of greatness that homage which is due only to the good.

True it is that on some occasions the Lion has been known, in the capriciousness of his disposition, to suffer his prostrate prey to escape but little injured from his clutch; but these instances are of rare occurrence, and may safely be referred either to his natural indolence, when excited neither by hunger nor by provocation, or to that intellectual debasement which among brutes is the usual concomitant of increased bulk and formidable strength. But to conclude from such whims and freaks, unaccountable as they may sometimes appear, that he is actuated by feelings of mercy, or by the natural impulse of a generous mind, would be about as reasonable as it would be to assume from the instances which are recorded of the justice and generosity of a Tamerlane or a Tippoo, that those monsters of sanguinary cruelty were in reality the mildest and most merciful of despots.

We have said that the Lion generally chooses the night for his excursions; and this is in fact the only time at which he ventures to approach the habitations of man, from which he will frequently carry off horses or oxen, apparently with the greatest ease, and almost without seeming to be incumbered by his burthen. Beyond the precincts of European civilization, and out of the reach of the dreaded rifle, he will sometimes penetrate into the very hut of the Bushman, and prey upon its human inhabitants. It is even stated, and on very respectable authority, that in some of the most distant kraals, or villages, those wretched people purposely expose the old and the infirm among them in such situations as they consider most open to attack, as the Lion’s share, in the expectation that he will instinctively seize upon those who are first thrown in his way. When, however, the Lion finds his appetite thus easily satiated, it is said that he is sure to return night after night to the kraal for a fresh victim; until the miserable remnant of its inhabitants at length find it absolutely necessary to quit the ground, and to seek a precarious safety in flight.

In the daytime, when pressed by hunger, the Lion takes his secret stand among the reeds and long grass in the neighbourhood of springs and rivers, and watches with unwearied patience for such animals as may, for the purpose of quenching their thirst, pass sufficiently near him to ensure the success of his attack. This is generally made in one enormous bound of fifteen, twenty, or even, it is said, thirty feet, and with a force capable of bearing to the ground and completely disabling the most formidable opponent. At times, however, he will pursue his prey somewhat more openly, and by quickly repeated springs; but this is an exertion which he is unable to continue for any considerable length of time, and which, consequently, any animal of moderate fleetness, that has fairly got the start of him, is certain to outstrip. Of this the Lion appears to be fully aware; for, if not successful in the commencement of the chase, he generally relinquishes it at once, and retires gradually, and step by step, to his place of ambush, to watch for a better opportunity and a more certain prey.