By this time the jungle around the cave where Nero lived seemed filled with the roarings of other lions. The very ground seemed to tremble. Nero was excited, but he was sure he could hunt well. He was a brave lion, and he knew he was strong and nearly full grown now, and he knew his teeth were sharp, as were his claws, and his paws were strong, both for striking and leaping, for that is how a lion hunts.
"Boom! Boom!" rolled out the lions' roars in the jungle.
"Ah, we shall have a grand hunt to-night!" said Nero's father. "I hope you are still hungry."
"Yes I am, very," answered the boy lion.
"That is good," returned the father. "Now we will start. At first stay close to me, but when you see a goat or a sheep or some other animal you think you would like to eat, spring on it and strike it with your claws."
Of course this sounds cruel, but lions must get their food this way; there is no other.
Suddenly Nero opened his mouth and gave a great roar, the loudest he had ever uttered. It shook the ground on which he stood. The trembling of the earth seemed to tickle the pads of skin and flesh of his paws, pads which were the same to him as your shoes are to you.
"Ha, that was a fine roar, Nero!" said his father. "Roar again!"
And Nero did, louder than at first.
"That's the way!" cried Mr. Lion. "That will tell the other jungle folk to keep out of our way when we are having a night-hunt."