Luckily, a faithful servant crept from behind with a gun, and suddenly shot the tiger through the head. The master leaped out of the room at once, before the tiger could reach him in his dying struggles.
But as for the lion, not only can he be tamed, but even a wild lion has been known to behave as if quite tame, when moved by his love. I shall now tell you two stories about that.
CHAPTER XII
The Lion a Noble Animal
Androcles and the Lion
Many, many years ago, the Romans ruled a large part of the world; for they were a great nation. Their territories included the north of Africa. A rich Roman, who lived there, had many slaves. One of his slaves was called Androcles (An´ drō clēz). The Roman treated Androcles very cruelly. So Androcles ran away from him.
But the Roman sent out many soldiers to capture Androcles. So after hiding in many places, Androcles was at last compelled to flee into wild regions, where there were few inhabitants. As the soldiers followed him even there, he had to go still farther into the interior of the country, till he came to the jungle. There he lived by eating fruits.
One day, toward evening, he was sitting on the ground, when suddenly he saw a lion before him. Poor Androcles gave himself up for lost, as he had no weapon with him with which even to try to fight the lion. He knew it was useless to try to run away, as the lion could catch him with a couple of bounds. So he thought that his only chance was to sit quite still, for then the lion might go away.