"About midnight I was awakened by an unusual noise in the cattle-fold, and looking out, saw all our horned cattle spring over the high thorn fence, and scamper round the place. Fancying that a hyæna, which I had heard howling when I went to bed, had alarmed the animals, I sallied forth to have a shot at it. I, however, could not find any cause for the disturbance, and calling a Hottentot to drive back the cattle, and shut them in, I again went to bed. The next morning Captain Cameron rode over to say, his herdsman had discovered that a large lion had followed us up the valley, and then, on further inspection, we found he had visited the fold, and carried off a sheep. He appeared to have retreated to the mountains, and we did not pursue him. "The lion, however, was not disposed to let us off so easily. He returned that night, and killed my favourite riding-horse, a little more than a hundred yards from my door; I then considered it right to take measures for defence, and called forth a party for his pursuit, the Hottentots saying that as he had only eaten a small part of the horse he would be in the vicinity. Seventeen horsemen, Mulattoes and Hottentots, and a number of strong hounds, soon assembled. "The Hottentots traced the lion on foot, discovering his spoor, or track, with surprising dexterity, and found him in a large thicket about a mile distant. The dogs failed to dislodge him, the Mulattoes rode round the jungle, and fired into it, but without effect. At last three Scotchmen determined to march in, provided the Mulattoes would support their fire. Regardless of the warnings of more prudent men, they went in, and, as they thought, found the lion crouched among the roots of a large evergreen bush, glaring at them from under the foliage. They fired and struck, not the lion, but a great block of sand-stone, which they bad mistaken for him; but beyond which he was actually lying. With a furious growl he bolted from the bush; the Mulattoes fled helter-skelter, leaving the Scots with empty guns, tumbling over each other in their haste to escape. In a twinkling he was upon them, with one stroke of his paw dashed John Rennie to the ground, and with one foot upon him, looked round upon his assailants in conscious power and pride, and with the most noble and imposing port that could be conceived. It was the most magnificent thing I ever witnessed; but the danger of our friends was too great to enjoy the picture. We expected every minute to see one or more of them torn to pieces; and yet in their position, one lying under the lion's paw, and the others scrambling towards us, we dared not fire. Fortunately, however, the lion, after steadily surveying us, turned calmly away, drove off the hounds with his heels, as if they had been rats, and bounded over the adjoining thicket like a cat, clearing bushes twelve or fifteen feet high, as if they had been tufts of grass.