“Shore!  An’ it beats hell!  When I got the skin of the lion the dogs killed I started to work up to the place I knowed you’d leave my horse.  It’s bad climbing where you came down.  I got on the side of that cliff an’ saw where I could work out, if I could climb a smooth place.  So I tried.  There was little cracks an’ ridges for my feet and hands.  All to once, just above where I helped you down, I heard a growl.  Looking up I saw a big lion, bigger’n any we chased except Sultan, an’ he was pokin’ his head out of a hole, an’ shore telling me to come no further.  I couldn’t let go with either hand to reach my gun, because I’d have fallen, so I yelled at him with all my might.  He spit at me an’ then walked out of the hole over the bench as proud as a lord an’ jumped down where I couldn’t see him any more.  I climbed out all right but he’d gone.  An’ I’ll tell you for a minute, he shore made me sweat.”

“By George!” I yelled, greatly excited.  “I heard that lion breathing.  Don chased him up there.  I heard hard, wheezing breaths somewhere behind me, but in the excitement I didn’t pay any attention to them.  I thought it was Jones panting, but now I know what it meant.”

“Shore.  He was there all the time, lookin’ at you an’ maybe he could have reached you.”

We were all too exhausted for more discussion and putting that off until the next day we sought our beds.  It was hardly any wonder that I felt myself jumping even in my sleep, and started up wildly more than once in the dead of night.

[Illustration:  Wild horses drinking on A promontory in the grand canyon]

Morning found us all rather subdued, yet more inclined to a philosophical resignation as regarded the difficulties of our special kind of hunting.  Capturing the lions on the level of the plateau was easy compared to following them down into canyons and bringing them up alone.  We all agreed that that was next to impossible.  Another feature, which before we had not considered, added to our perplexity and it was a dawning consciousness that we would be perhaps less cruel if we killed the lions outright.  Jones and Emett arrayed themselves on the side that life even in captivity was preferable; while Jim and I, no doubt still under the poignant influence of the last lion’s heroic race and end, inclined to freedom or death.  We compromised on the reasonable fact that as yet we had shown only a jackass kind of intelligence.

[Illustration:  Jones and Emett packing lion on horse]

[Illustration:  Jones climbing up to lasso lion]