The blow brought him up all standing, and
he fell forward on his head.
The soft-nosed Winchester bullet had gone straight through the
chest cavity, smashing the lungs and the big blood-vessels of the
heart. Painfully he recovered his feet, and tried to come on, his
ferocious courage holding out to the last; but he staggered and
turned from side to side, unable to stand firmly, still less to
advance at a faster pace than a walk. He had not ten seconds to
live; but it is a sound principle to take no chances with lions.
Tarlton hit him with his second bullet probably in the shoulder;
and with my next shot I broke his neck. I had stopped him when he
was still a hundred yards away, and certainly no finer sight could
be imagined than that of this great maned lion as he charged.
[Footnote: "African Game Trails," pp. 192-3.]
To the man who can shoot straight, and shoot just as straight at a
savage animal as at a target, African game-hunting is for part of
the time not very dangerous. Nine or ten lions or elephants or
rhinoceros may be killed, without seeming risk. The tenth time
something unexpected happens, and death comes very near to the
hunter.
In shooting an elephant in the forest one day, Roosevelt had what
was perhaps his closest call since the bear nearly killed him,
years before in Idaho. He had just shot an elephant, when there
came a surprise:
But at that very instant, before there was a moment's time in
which to reload, the thick bushes parted immediately on my left
front, and through them surged the vast bulk of a charging bull
elephant, the matted mass of tough creepers snapping like
packthread before his rush.
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