“Yes,” replied the trader, “I have heard of the story. The Hottentot was a lucky fellow. You see, a lion, in his disposition and habits, is nothing more or less than a great cat. Some people speak of the lion’s magnanimity, and ascribe some noble qualities to the beast; but that is all nonsense. When a lion is not hungry, if he meets with game he will frequently pass it by without notice. He will seldom kill it out of mere wantonness and cruelty; but neither will a cat, unless it has been taught to do so. A cat, when it is not hungry, will sometimes play with a mouse; that, you would think, must be from a cruel disposition; but, in reality, it is only keeping the creature alive for its next meal. Now, this is exactly what the lion sometimes does, and particularly one that has tasted human flesh; so the natives, at least, will tell you. The natives say that, in such a case, the lion usually waits for the man to go to sleep, and then watches him till he begins to move and shows signs of awaking, when he pounces upon him. In the case of the Hottentot, the lion must have been frightened away by something that occurred while the man was asleep. For myself, I did not doubt that the creature was watching me with the intention of waiting until I should fall asleep from exhaustion, and then springing upon me at the first movement I made. I was safe, I thought, so long as I could keep my eyes open; but if I went to sleep, I should certainly awake in the lion’s jaws.” There was something so peculiarly frightful, as well as unexpected, in the picture thus conveyed, that I could not restrain a shudder and an exclamation of horror. “Oh, don’t be alarmed on my account,” said Hutton, with a laugh, “You see I am here all alive and whole. I only want you to understand what the danger really was before I tell you how I escaped. You know I had been up all night, and was tolerably hungry and tired. I had brought a flask full of water with me, and had just emptied it that morning; so that, by good luck, I was not at all thirsty. But for that, I do not know how I should have been able to hold out through the day. The sun came up bright and clear, as it usually is in those deserts, with a blaze of heat, which was reflected from the sand about me until it seemed to burn my skin. I had a broad-brimmed felt hat, with ostrich feathers round it, which warded off the direct rays; but still I think I never felt the sun more oppressive; perhaps it was because I was weak from fasting and want of rest. Still I kept my self-possession, and was constantly on the watch to take advantage of any opportunity for escape. There was just a chance that my men might muster courage enough to come down in a body to my relief; but I believed them to be too chicken-hearted to approach within a quarter of a mile of a lion, and besides, there was the probability that the brute, if he should see them approaching, would spring upon me, and put me out of suspense at once.”