The Jig-Jigga country, a province of Abyssinia lying near the border of British Somaliland and governed by Abdullah Dowa, an Arab sheik owing allegiance to King Menelek, is the best lion country in all Africa. Jig-Jigga is an arid plateau averaging 5,000 feet above sea level, poorly watered but generously grassed, sparsely timbered with the thorny mimosa (full brother to the Texas _mesquite_), and swarming everywhere with innumerable varieties of the wild game on which the lion preys and fattens--eland, oryx, hartebeest, gazelle, and zebra. There are two ways of hunting lion. First, from the perfectly safe shelter of a zareba, a tightly enclosed hut built of thorny mimosa bows, with no opening but a narrow porthole for rifle fire. Within the _zareba_ the hunter is shut in at nightfall by his _shikaris_, usually having one _shikari_ with him, sometimes with a goat as a third companion and a lure for lion. An occasional bite of the goat's ear by sharp _shikari_ teeth inspires shrill bleats sure to bring any lion lurking near in range of the hunter's rifle. At other times goat ears are spared, and the loudest-braying donkey of the caravan is picketed immediately in front of the _zareba's_ porthole, his normal vocal activities stimulated by the occasional prod of a stick. Sometimes several weary sleepless nights are spent without result, but sooner or later, without the slightest sound hinting his approach, suddenly a great yellow body flashes out of the darkness and upon the cringing lure. For an instant there are the sinister sounds of savage snarls, rending flesh, cracking bones and screams of pain and fear, and then a dull red flash heralds the rifle's roar, and the tawny terror falls gasping his life out across his prey. The second, and the only sportsmanlike way of lion-hunting, is by tracking him in the open. The pony men circle till they find a trail, follow it till close enough to the game to race ahead and bring it to bay, circle about it while a messenger brings up the _Sahib_, who dismounts and advances afoot to a combat wherein the echo of a misplaced shot may sound his own death-knell. One morning while camped in the Jig-Jigga country, William Marlow, our _Sahib's_ valet, was out with the pony men trailing a wounded oryx, while the _Sahib_ himself was three miles away shooting eland. In mid forenoon Marlow's men struck the fresh track of two great male lions, plainly out on a hunting party of their own.