Scarcely were the words out of my mouth, when he was on his feet by my
side with a large burning log in his hand. He sprang forward, and
before I could stop him had dashed it full in the face of the savage
brute. So astonished was the lion that, without an attempt at
retaliation, he turned round, and with Solon barking defiance at him,
dashed off again into the bush. Though we did not think that the same
lion would come again, the lesson was not lost on us, and we resolved to
have a large fire blazing, and to keep watch during the night. As I sat
up during my part of the watch, constantly keeping my eyes around me, I
could hear the lions muttering and calling to each other with sounds
very unlike the roar they utter when they are quarrelling over a carcass
or about to spring on their prey. There were, too, the cries of
jackals, the laughing of hyenas, the occasional trumpeting of an
elephant, the croakings of night-birds, or of insects or reptiles of
various sorts, which, all mingled together, formed a concert which
effectually banished sleep, and was anything but enlivening and
inspiriting. Thus passed my second night in the midst of an African
desert.