We might multiply these examples if we chose, but the two fragments we have reproduced will, we hope, send our readers to the British Museum to see the _Hunt of Assurbanipal_ for themselves. In any case they are enough to prove that the Assyrian sculptor studied the lion from nature. He was not without opportunities. He was, no doubt, allowed to assist at those great hunts of which he was to be the official chronicler. He there saw the king of beasts throw himself on the spears of the footmen or fly before the arrows of the charioteers, and break the converging line of beaters; he saw him fall under his repeated wounds and struggle in his last convulsions. Later on he could supplement his recollections, he could complete and correct his sketches by the examination of the victims.[190] At the end of the day the “bag” was displayed as it is now at the end of a modern _battue_, when the keepers bring pheasants, hares and rabbits, and lay them in long rows in some clearing or corner of the covert. In one of the Kouyundjik reliefs we see the king standing before an altar and doing his homage to the gods after the emotions and dangers of a hunt that was almost a battle.[191] He seems to pour the wine of the libation upon four dead lions, which his attendants have arranged in line upon the ground. There must also have been tame lions in the palaces and royal parks. Even now they are often to be met with in that country, under the tent of the Arab chief or in the house of the bey or pacha.[192] When captured quite young the lion is easily educated, and, provided that his appetite is never allowed to go unsatisfied, he may be an inoffensive and almost a docile companion until he is nearly full grown. We are ready to believe that the lion and lioness shown in our Fig. 77 were tame ones. The background of the relief suggests a park attached to the royal residence, rather than a marsh, jungle or desert. Vines heavy with fruit and bending flowers rise above the dozing lioness; we can hardly suppose that wild animals could intrude into such a garden. It follows, then, that the artist could study his models as they moved at freedom among the trees of the royal demesne, basking idly in the sun or stretching themselves when they rose, or burying their gleaming teeth on the living prey thrown to them by their keepers.