Lions come to their full strength at five years, but live a long time; for instance, one from the Gambia was proved to be sixty-three years of age. They sleep by day, and feed by night, lap their drink, and delight in coming forth in the midst of furious storms, when they add their mighty roars to those of the elements. Seldom does a tempest rage in tropical Africa, but its fearful sounds are increased by the din of wild animals; that of the lion being heard above all others. Countless are the histories of his depredations, and numerous are the daring and gallant exploits performed by Europeans against this noble game; the following is an abridgment of a narrative, from the pen of the Marchioness of Hastings; and published in the Miscellany of Natural History; herself being the heroine of the chase. "The field was taken in quest of three lions, supposed to be lurking near the tents. The ground was flat and ploughed. When we came to the edge of the jungle, we halted a little; the people came round in crowds, and, in a few minutes, the trees were covered with men, placed there by Fraser for observation. When we were sent for, we found Fraser by the side of the great canal--he had received intelligence of both a lion and a tiger, and he desired Barton and myself to go down upon an elephant, watch the bed of the canal, and move slowly to the south, while he advanced in a contrary direction. The rest of the party were to beat the jungle above, which was too thick to admit the passage of an elephant through it. We fell in with Fraser where the canal was a little wider, and neither of us had been successful, though we had searched every bush with our eyes, in passing along. He desired us to wait till he had mounted the bank to look after the rest of the elephants. He had hardly gone away before a lioness crossed the narrow neck of the canal, just before us, and clambered up the opposite bank. I fired, but missed her, and she ran along the bank to the westward. We turned round and had the mortification of seeing her again go through the water, at which our elephant became refractory, wheeled about, and was so unsteady as to prevent us from firing. We followed her up to the thicket, put the elephant's head into it, and we heard the lioness growling close to us. Just as we were expecting her charge and had prepared our guns, round wheeled the elephant again, and became perfectly unmanageable. During the scuffle between the elephant and his driver, we heard the cry that the lioness was again off. She again crossed the Nullah, and just as we had got our elephant to go well in, the lioness ran back, and crouched under a thicket on our left, where she had been originally started. All this happened in less than a minute. Fraser then called to us to come round the bush, as the lioness being on a line with us, we prevented him from firing. Just as we got out of his reach, he fired, and when the elephant stopped I did the same.