With all these advantages, we shall not wonder that the feline family and their near relations were the rulers of the forests and plains and mountains till man came to conquer them, or that lions and large cats, something like those living now, together with the fierce sabre-toothed tiger (Machairodus), roamed over Europe, Asia, and North and South America, where the crowds of vegetable-feeders offered them plenty of food. They were even numerous in England, where the lion chased the elk and the wild cattle, before he was driven back to Africa, Persia, and Bengal. No doubt in those days he scraped out his den in the valley of the Thames, as he still does in some quiet spot in the African plains where he hunts alone, except when his little ones are born, and then for some time he lives with his lioness, helping her to provide for them, and taking out the cubs as soon as they are a year old to teach them to hunt, to leap upon their prey, and to strike it with their paw, educating them like a true father in getting their living. And when they are three years old, the young lions will go off and meet together, two or three in a party, till in the spring each one seeks a wife for himself, having many a fierce battle with other lions before he can win her, and finding then the use of his thick mane in protecting his neck from the teeth of his rivals. So the “king of the beasts” lives “On the mountains bred, Glorious in strength;” for though by no means so large as people generally imagine, compared to the buffaloes, or horses, or large antelopes which he attacks, yet his immense strength generally secures him the victory over all but the rhinoceros and the elephant, and he feeds in a royal manner, sharing his hunting grounds only with the leopard, and leaving the remains of his feast for the hyænas and jackals following in his track. Then just where his reign ends in Bengal, that of the tiger begins, that splendid and ferocious cat, larger even than the lion, which spares no animal, and will fight till death even with those stronger than himself. When we see our own house-cat playing with a mouse, striking at it, letting it escape, and at last giving it the final grip, we are watching in miniature the cruel game which is played in the dense jungles of Asia by the tiger with the antelopes, young buffaloes, and other terrified animals. Yet when we see the mother cat caressing her little ones, this too is true to tiger life, for though the father does not watch and care for his children as the lion does, the tigress loves them with the utmost devotion, and attacks all who come near them, dying sooner than forsake her cubs.