one knows how the matter was managed;
but every one knows that, when the executioner
presented himself, the cell was empty.
The two brothers, who had succeeded in
escaping, after vain exertions to cut or open
their common fetter, proceeded across country,
in order to avoid any unpleasant meeting.
When daylight came, they hid themselves in
the rocks; at night, they continued their
journey. In the middle of the night, they
met a lion. The two brothers began by
throwing stones at him and shouting with all
their strength to drive him away; but the
animal lay down before them, and would not
stir. Finding that threats and insults did no
good, they tried the effect of prayers; but
the lion bounded upon them, dashed them to
the ground, and amused himself by eating the
elder of the two at the side of his brother,
who pretended to be dead. When the lion
came to the leg which was confined by the
iron fetter, finding it resisted his teeth, he cut
off the lirnb above the knee. Then, whether
he had eaten enough, or whether he was
thirsty, he proceeded to a spring a little way
off. The poor surviving wretch looked
around for a place of refuge; for he was
afraid the lion would come back again after
drinking. And therefore, dragging after him
his brother's leg, he contrived to hide himself
in a silo, which he had the good luck to find
close by. Shortly afterwards, he heard the
lion roaring with rage and pacing to and fro
close to the hole in which he had retreated.
At last, daylight came, and the lion departed.
The instant that the unfortunate man got
out of the silo, he found himself in the
presence of several of the Bey's cavalry, who
were on his track. One of them took him up
on horseback behind him, and he was brought
back to Constantine, where they put him into
prison again. The Bey, scarcely believing
the facts related by his vassals, desired to see
the man, and had him appear before him,
still dragging after him his brother's leg.
Ahmed-Bey, notwithstanding his reputation
for cruelty, ordered the fetter to be broken,
and granted the poor wretch his life.

It is now time to buckle on our game-bag,
and go out with M. Gérard to shoot a lion to
put into it.

"My aid had been requested,"— writes the
Lion-killer,— " by the inhabitants of the
Mahouna (circle of Ghelma), to rid them of a
family of lions who had taken up their
quarters among them, and who abused the
rights of hospitality. On arriving there, I
received all the requisite information, and
I learned that every night they went to
drink in the Oued-Cherf. I immediately
repaired to the borders of that stream, and
found there, not only those gentry's footmarks
on the sand, but also the points of
their usual approach and departure. The
family was numerous; it consisted of the
father, mother, and three grown-up children.
According to the natives, their den was
situated in an impenetrable stronghold
halfway up the mountain. Old Taiieb, the
chieftain of the place, came to me, took me by the
arm, and said, as he pointed to the numerous
tracks imprinted on the water's edge,

"' They are too many for us; let us come
away.'

"At that epoch, I had already passed more
than a hundred nights alone and unsheltered,
with the starry firmament for my roof,
sometimes seated at the bottom of a ravine
frequented by lions, sometimes beating the
narrow paths which were scarcely
distinguishable through the woods. I had met
with gangs of marauders and with lions, and,
by the help of God and St. Hubert, I had
always got out of my difficulties unharmed.
Only, experience had taught me that two
bullets rarely sufficed to kill an adult lion;
and every time I opened a fresh campaign, I
could not help remembering such and such a
night which seemed a little too long, either
because I had been suddenly attacked by the
fever which compelled my hand to tremble
when I commanded it to be firm, or because
an unwelcome thunderstorm had prevented
my seeing the least thing whatever near me
for whole hours, and that at moments when
the rolling thunder was responded to by the
lion's roar, so close that I regarded every
flash of lightning as a lucky event whose
continuance I would have purchased at the price
of half my blood.

"But still, I loved this solitary life; I sought
it from a feeling of nationality, for the sake
of lowering the malevolent pride of the
Arabs, whom I delighted to see bow down
before a Frenchman; not so much for the
services which he gratuitously rendered them
at the risk of his life, but because he
accomplished alone what they dared not undertake
in company. And thus, not only was every
lion who fell a subject to them of astonishment;
but, moreover, they could not understand
how a stranger dare venture alone by
night into ravines which the natives avoided
in broad day light. In the eyes of the Arabs
(brave in war, brave everywhere except in
the presence of " the master," who, they say,
derives his strength, from God) the sportsman
has no need to awaken the douars of the
mountains by a distant gunshot, in order to
obtain a triumph. It is enough for him to
quit his tent at the evening twilight, and to
return safe and sound at the point of day. It
will be easily understood that this feeling of
the popular mind made it a law for me
to proceed in the path I had traced out; that
it even afforded me a great support against
emotions which were sometimes too strong;
and, I am not ashamed to add, against the
mental agony of nocturnal isolation in a
country abounding with perils of every
description.

"If, amongst the sportsmen for whose sake
I have written these lines, there were one who
desired to enter the lists,— in order to make