“Merciful Heaven!” exclaimed Alexander, “and no one hurt!”
“No, master; lion spring at antelope. Now we shall find him on other side of the bush, and kill him easy, when his eyes are shut.”
Bremen led the way round the copse, followed by our travellers; they soon arrived on the other side of it, with their guns all ready; but on their arrival, to their astonishment, they perceived the lion and the male gemsbok lying together. The antelope was dead, but the lion still alive; though the horns of the gemsbok had passed through his body. At the sight of the hunters, the lion, pierced through as he was, raised his head with a loud roar, and struck out with his paw, as he twisted towards them, his eyes glaring like hot coals, and showing his tremendous fangs. Alexander was the first who fired, and the ball penetrating the brain of the noble animal, it fell down dead upon the body of the antelope.
“This is the finest sight I ever witnessed,” observed Swinton. “I have heard that the gemsboks’ horns are sometimes fatal to the lion, but I could hardly credit it. They have passed nearly through his body; the points are under the skin.”
“Now we know, master, why gemsbok have his nose to the ground and his horn pointed,” said Bremen; “he saw the lion, and fought him to save his herd.”
“I am quite stunned yet,” observed Alexander. “What a noble animal it is! Well, at all events, I can say that I have shot a lion, which is more than you can, Major.”
“I only wish that when I shoot one I may have no more danger to incur,” replied the Major. “What a different idea does one have of a lion in a menagerie and one in its free and native state. Why, the menagerie lions can’t roar at all; they are nothing but over grown cats, compared to the lion of the desert.”
“That is very true,” observed Swinton; “however, I am delighted, for now I have not only my gemsbok, which is a gem above price, but also as fine a lion as I have ever seen. I should like to have them stuffed and set up just as they were before Alexander killed them. His rage and agony combined were most magnificent. After all, the lion is the king of the beasts. Bremen, send Swanevelt to the caravan for some of the men. I must have both skin and skeleton of the antelope, and the skin of the lion.”
Our travellers were quite satisfied with the sport of the day, and after waiting for some time, while the Hottentots disentangled the animals and took off the skins, they returned to the caravan, Omrah having secured a portion of the flesh of the gemsbok for their supper.
As they were returning, they observed a herd of buffaloes at a great distance, and proposed to themselves the hunting of them after they had halted on the following day, if the animals were at any reasonable distance from them. At supper the flesh of the antelope was pronounced better than that of the gnoo; and after supper, as soon as the cattle had been all secured, and the fires lighted, Alexander proposed that Swinton should finish his history of Africaner.