He awakened refreshed, and the first thought in his mind was, “I’m in lion-land at last!” But the thought sent a cold shiver through him, and he dived under the bedclothes.  A moment later he determined to be up.  Exclaiming, “Now for the lions!” he jumped on the floor and began his preparations.

His plan was to get out at once into the country, take ambush for the night, shoot the first lion that came along, and then back to the hotel for breakfast.  So off he went, carrying not only his usual arsenal, but the marvellous patent tent strapped to his back.  He attracted no little attention as he trudged along, and catching sight of a very fine camel, his heart beat fast, for he thought the lions could not be far off now.

It was quite dark by the time he had got only a little way beyond the outskirts of the town, scrambling over ditches and bramble-hedges.  After much hard work of this kind, the mighty hunter suddenly stopped, whispering to himself, “I seem to smell a lion hereabouts.”  He sniffed keenly in all directions.  To his excited imagination, it seemed a likely place for a lion; so, dropping on one knee, and laying one of his guns in front of him, he waited.

He waited very patiently.  One hour, two hours; but nothing stirred.  Then he suddenly remembered that great lion-hunters take a little young goat with them to attract the lion by its bleating.  Having forgotten to supply himself with one, Tartarin conceived the happy idea of bleating like a kid.  He started softly, calling, “Meh, meh!” He was really afraid that a lion might hear him, but as no lion seemed to be paying attention, he became bolder in his “mehs,” until the noise he made was more like the bellowing of a bull.

But hush!  What was that?  A huge black object had for the moment loomed up against the dark blue sky.  It stooped, sniffing the ground; then seemed to move away again, only to return suddenly.  It must be the lion at last; so, taking a steady aim, bang went the gun of Tartarin, and a terrible howling came in response.  Clearly his shot had told; the wounded lion had made off.  He would now wait for the female to appear, as he had read in books.

But two or more hours passed, and she did not come; and the ground was damp, and the night air cold, so the hunter thought he would camp for the night.  After much struggling, he could not get his patent tent to open.  Finally, he threw it on the ground in a rage, and lay on the top of it.  Thus he slept until the bugles in the barracks near by wakened him in the morning.  For behold, instead of finding himself out on the Sahara, he was in the kitchen garden of some suburban Algerian!

“These people are mad,” he growled to himself, “to plant their artichokes where lions are roaming about.  Surely I have been dreaming.  Lions do come here; there’s proof positive.”

From artichoke to artichoke, from field to field, he followed the thin trail of blood, and came at length to a poor little donkey he had wounded!