In Africa Part 21

[Drawing: _It Would Have Been Historic_]

Talk about dejection! Our ride back to town was as mournful as a ride could be. We thought of the glory of driving through the streets of Nairobi with a lion or two hanging over the back of the carriage. It would have been historic. Citizens would have talked of it for years. It would have taken an honored place in the lion-hunting literature of Africa, for no lion hunters have ever pursued a band of lions in a carriage and brought back a carriage-load of them.

We almost regretted having had the chance that we so heartbreakingly lost.

But we told about it when we struck town, and before the day was over it was the topic in hotels and clubs throughout the whole town of Nairobi.

Everybody who had a gun was resolved to go out the next day, and interest was at a fever pitch.

We went out again the following morning, shot at wildebeests at all known ranges, from two hundred yards up to five hundred yards--but our luck was against us. We came back empty-handed, and our chief reward for the morning's work was the great privilege of seeing both Mount Kenia, ninety miles north, and Kilima-Njaro, nearly two hundred miles southeast, as clear as a cameo against the lovely African sky.

The lesson of this story is not so much a review of bad shooting or of bad luck. The thing that seems most noteworthy is that within six or seven miles from Nairobi, nearly all the time within sight of the house-tops of that town, we had seen fifteen varieties of wild game, some of which were present in great numbers.

Wildebeest Hartebeest Hyena Jackal Thompson's Gazelle Lion Rabbit Waterbuck Impalla Giant Bustard Ostrich Wart-hog Wild Dog Steinbuck Grant's Gazelle

Surely there is still some game left in Africa.

CHAPTER XIX

THE LAST WORD IN LION HUNTING. METHODS OF TRAILING, ENSNARING AND OTHERWISE OUTWITTING THE KING OF BEASTS. A CHAPTER OF ADVENTURES

If some one were to start a correspondence course in lion hunting he would give diagrams and instructions showing how to kill a lion in about six different styles--namely:

The boma method.

The tall gra.s.s method.

The riding method.

The tree method.

The lariat method.

The spear method.

This list does not include the Ananias method, formerly popular.

The tree and boma methods are much esteemed by those sportsmen who wish to reduce personal danger to the least common denominator--the sportsmen who think discretion is the better part of valor and a hunter in a tree is worth two in the bush. The sportsman who confines himself to the tree method is ent.i.tled to receive a medal "for conspicuous caution in times of danger," and the loved ones at home need never worry about his safe return. For safe lion hunting the "tree" method would get "first prize,"

while the "boma" method would receive honorable mention.

The "tall gra.s.s" method is less popular in that the lion has some show and often succeeds in getting away to tell about it. It involves danger to all concerned.

[Drawing: _Spearing Lions_]

The "riding" method is also dangerous, for in it the hunter endeavors to "round up" or "herd" a lion by riding him to a standstill. When the lion is fighting mad he stops and turns upon his persecutors. This is when the obituary columns thrive.

The "lariat" method is not as yet in general vogue, but I understand that "Buffalo" Jones, an American, succeeded in roping a lion as they rope cattle out west. It sounds diverting.

[Photograph: By courtesy of W.D. Boyce. A Dead Lion Is a Sign for Jubilation]

[Photograph: A Dethroned King of Beasts]

The "spear" method is that employed by natives, who, armed with spear and shield, surround a lion and then kill it with their spears. They invariably succeed, but not until a few of the spear-bearers are more or less Fletcherized by the lion. This method does not appeal to those who wish to get home to tell about it, and need not be considered at length in any correspondence course.

[Drawing: _The Tree Method_]

The tree method is comparatively simple. You build a platform in a tree and place a bait near it. Then you wait through the long, silent watches of the night for Felis Leo to appear. The method has few dangers. The chief one lies in falling asleep and tumbling out of the tree, but this is easily obviated by making the platform large enough for two or three men, two of whom may stretch out and sleep while the other one remains awake and keeps guard.

When I went to Africa I resolved never to climb a tree. Later I resolved to try the tree method in order to get experience in a form of lion hunting that has many advocates among the valiant hunters who want lion skins at no expense to their own.

Of course, there are some perils connected with this method of lion slaying. Mosquitoes may bite you, causing a dreadful fever that may later result in death in some lingering and costly form. Also the biting ants may pursue you up to your aery perch and take small but effective bites in many itchable but unscratchable points. These elements of danger are about the only ones encountered in the tree method of lion hunting, but then who could expect to kill lions without some degree of personal discomfort?

My one and only tree experience was not particularly eventful. A large and commodious platform was built in the forks of a great tree in a district where the questing grunt of lions could be heard each night.

The platform was comfortable; it only needed hot and cold running water to be a delightful place to spend a tropic night.

I shot a hartebeest and had it dragged beneath the tree. Then my two native gunbearers and I made a satisfactory ascent to the platform. We had a thermos bottle filled with hot tea, and some odds and ends in the way of solid refreshments. We then stretched out in positions that commanded a view of the hartebeest and waited patiently for an obliging lion to come and be shot.

Night came on and soon the landscape became shadowy and indistinct.

Trees and bushes fused into vague black ma.s.ses and the carca.s.s of the bait could be located only because it seemed a shade more opaque than the opaque gloom around it. The more you looked at it the more elusive and shifting it seemed. The sights of the rifle were invisible, and the only way one could find the sight was by aiming at a star and then carefully lowering the direction of the weapon until it approximately pointed at the carca.s.s.

Of course, we were very still; even the stars were not more silent than we. And little by little the noises of an African night were heard, growing in volume until from all sides came the cries of night birds and the songs of insects and tree-toads. It was the apotheosis of loneliness. And thus we sat, with eyes straining to pierce the gloom that hedged us in. We could see no sign of life, yet all about us in those dark shadows there were thousands of creatures moving about on their nightly hunt.

Suddenly there came the soft crescendo of a hyena's howl some place off in the night. It was answered by another, miles away; then another, far off in a still different direction. The scent of the bait was spreading to the far horizon and the keen-scented carrion-eaters had caught it and were hurrying to the feast.

Then, after moments of waiting, the howls came from so near that they startled us. There seemed to be dozens of hyenas--a regular cla.s.s reunion of them--yet not one could be seen in the "murky gloom." And then, a moment later, we heard the crunching of teeth and the slither of rending flesh, and we knew that a supper party of hyenas was gathered about the festal board below us. I was afraid that they would eat up the carca.s.s and thus keep away the lions, so I fired a shot to scare them away. There was a quick rush of feet--then that dense, expectant silence once more. Soon some little jackals came and were shooed away. Then more hyenas came, were given their conge, and hurried off to the tall gra.s.s.

And yet no lion. It was quite disappointing.

At midnight, far off to the north, came the grunting voice of a lion. I waited eagerly for the next sound which would indicate whether the lure of the bait was beckoning him on. And soon the sound came, this time much nearer, and after a long silence there was a sharp, snarling grunt of a lion, followed by the panic-stricken rush of a hundred heavy hoofs.

The conjunction of sounds told the story as definitely as if the whole scene lay bared to view. The lion had leaped upon a hartebeest, probably instantly breaking its neck, while the rest of the herd had galloped away in terror. And it had all happened within two or three hundred yards of the tree--yet nothing could be seen.

At two o'clock the grunt of a lion was again heard far off to the south.

It came steadily toward us, and at last there was no doubt about its destination. It was coming to the bait. How my eyes strained to pierce the darkness and how breathlessly I waited with rifle in readiness! But the lion only paused at the bait, and as I waited for it to settle down to its feast it went grunting away and the chance was gone. Perhaps it had already fed, or perhaps it was an unusually fastidious lion which desired to do its own killing.

An hour or two later, both gunbearers asleep and one snoring peacefully, I became aware of a large animal feeding at the bait. Although no sound had preceded its coming, I thought it might be a lion, but feared that it was a hyena. I fired at the dark, shifting, black shadow and the roar of the big rifle shattered the silence like a clap of unexpected thunder. Then there was such a dense silence that it seemed to ring in one's ears.

Had I hit or missed? That could not be decided until daybreak, for it is the height of folly to climb down from a tree to feel the pulse of a wounded lion.

When daybreak came we made an investigation. Only the mangled remains of the carca.s.s lay below. Later in the day some members of our party came across the dead body of a hyena lying about a hundred yards from the tree, partly hidden by a little clump of bushes. Its backbone was shattered by a .475 bullet.

Thus ended my first and only adventure in the "tree method."

The boma method is slightly more dangerous and much more exciting. A lot of thorn branches are twisted together in a little circle, within which the hunter sits and waits for his lion. As in the tree method, a bait is placed near the boma, twelve or fifteen yards away, and a little loophole is arranged in the tangle of thorn branches through which the rifle may be trained upon the bait.

[Drawing: _The Boma Method_]

The lion can not get into the boma unless he jumps up and comes in from the top. It is the function of the hunter to prevent this strategic manoeuver by killing the lion before he gets in. If he does not, he is likely to find himself engaged in a spirited hand-to-hand fight with an unfriendly lion in a s.p.a.ce about as big as the upper berth of a sleeping-car.

My first boma was a meshwork of thorns piled and interwoven together with the architectural simplicity of an Eskimo igloo. When it was finished there didn't seem to be the ghost of a chance of a lion getting in; but at night, as I looked out, it seemed frail indeed. Some dry gra.s.s was piled inside, with blankets spread over it to prevent rustling; and when night came we three, myself and two gunbearers, wormed our way in and then pulled some pieces of brush into the opening after us. The rifles were sighted on the bait while it was still daylight and at a spot where the expected lion might appear. Then we waited.

The customary nocturne by birds, beasts and insects began before long, and several times hyenas and jackals came to the bait, but no lions. The boma was on the edge of a great swamp, miles in extent and a great rendezvous for game of many kinds. Theoretically, there couldn't be a better place to expect lions, but nary a lion appeared that night.