“---- as leaps a famish’d Lion fell On beeves that graze some marshy meadow’s breadth A countless herd, tended by one unskill’d To cope with savage beasts in their defence, Beside the foremost kine or with the last He paces heedless, but the Lion, borne Impetuous on the hindmost, one devours And scatters all the rest.” “But as the Lion on the mountains bred, Glorious in strength, when he hath seized the best And fairest of the herd, with savage fangs First breaks her neck, then laps the bloody paunch Torn wide. Meantime, around him, but remote, Dogs stand and swains clamouring, yet by fear Repress’d, annoy him not or dare approach.” The Lion is said sometimes to develop the taste for “man-eating,” which makes the Tiger so terrible. This, however, is comparatively rare, except in old animals; but, whether he eats men by choice or not his depredations are fearfully extensive, especially when he has had a good deal of experience, knows exactly when to attack a place, and has lost wholly or in part the fear of man, which usually distinguishes him. Here is an account of the termination of the career of one of these heroes, a perfect Dick Turpin among Lions, so great had become his skill in “lifting”:-- “We had not been many days at that place, when a magnificent Lion suddenly appeared one night in the midst of a village. A small Dog that had incautiously approached the beast paid the penalty of its life for its daring. The next day a grand chase was got up, but the Lion, being on his guard, managed to elude his pursuers. The second day, however, he was killed by Messrs. Galton and Bam; and, on cutting him up, the poor Dog was found, still undigested, in his stomach, bitten into five pieces. The natives highly rejoiced at the successful termination of the hunt; for this Lion had proved himself to be one of the most daring and destructive ever known, having, in a short time, killed upwards of fifty Oxen, Cows, and Horses. When he had previously been chased he had always escaped unscathed, and every successive attack made upon him only served to increase his ferocity.”