Nero, the Circus Lion | Page 8

came a roar, but not a very loud
one.
"What's that?" asked Nero of Switchie.
"Oh, that isn't any thing. Don't be afraid," answered the other lion.
"I'm not afraid!" said Nero. "Only, I want to learn things. I never
hunted in the jungle at night before, and I don't know so much about it
as you do. What was that noise?"
"Oh," said Switchie, easily, "that, I suppose, was my father, or yours,
killing some big animal. Maybe it was a buffalo. We'll soon find out."
And the two boy lions did. As they came to an open place in the jungle
they saw Nero's father and that of Switchie crouching near something
big and black lying on the ground. Off to one side was a lion, licking,
with his big red tongue, a sore place on his leg.
"What happened?" asked Nero quickly, of his father.
"We killed a buffalo, Cruncher and I," said Mr. Lion, as he nodded
toward Switchie's father, whose name was Cruncher. "We killed a
buffalo, but my cousin, Chaw, is hurt. The buffalo stuck him with one
of his horns. Then I struck down the buffalo. Here, Nero, is a bit of
meat for you, and, Switchie, you may have some. But not much. This
meat belongs to Cruncher and me. We will give you a little, but, if you
want any more, you must hunt for yourselves. I fed you when you were
a little baby lion, Nero, but now that you are big you must learn to feed

and hunt for yourself."
And this, too, is the law of the jungle.
Switchie and Nero eagerly ate the bits of meat the older lions gave
them, and then the hunt went on. Nero was still very hungry, and so
was Switchie, and pretty soon Nero saw a small animal creeping along
through the jungle.
"Ah, you are trying to get away from me!" thought Nero, who had gone
to one side, and away from the others. "But I'll get you!"
Then he stalked, or crept softly after, the animal, which was a big rabbit,
and, all of a sudden, Nero leaped and caught the smaller beast.
"At last I have hunted for myself!" thought Nero, as he ate his meal.
"This is great! But it is not enough. I must have more!"
He went farther on in the jungle, and, all at once, he heard a goat
bleating.
"Baa-a-a-a! Baa!" bleated the goat.
"Ha! There is something else I can catch for my supper!" thought Nero.
"I am getting to be quite a hunter!"
By this time he was far off from his father and the other lions. But he
did not mind that. He felt sure he could find his way back when he
needed to.
"But first I'll catch that goat," said Nero.
Carefully he stalked through the jungle, coming nearer and nearer to
where he could hear the goat bleating. At last, in an open place in the
jungle, where the moon shone brightly, Nero saw the goat, a white one.
It seemed caught fast in a vine, and could not move.
"Ah, I can easily get this fellow!" thought the boy lion.

He crouched for a spring, and was just going to leap through the air and
on the back of the goat when, suddenly, there was a loud sound, like a
small clap of thunder, and at once Nero felt a sharp pain in one paw. He
rolled over and over, howling and roaring in pain and anger.
At the same time a man hidden on a platform built up in a tree, cried
out:
"Oh, I have shot a lion! I have shot a lion!"
CHAPTER IV
NERO IN A CAVE
Now while the hunter, hidden on a platform in a tree in the jungle, was
shouting about having shot a lion, Nero was doing some shouting of
another sort. To tell the truth, he was howling and roaring, just as,
sometimes, when you step on the puppy's tail, by mistake, of course,
the puppy howls. Nero was howling and roaring with pain.
"Oh, what has happened? What is the matter?" cried Nero, in lion talk,
of course, as he rolled over and over on the dried leaves of the jungle.
"What a terrible pain in my paw! Oh, I wonder if the goat did this! If he
did--"
Nero stopped his howling long enough to try to stand up and look
through the jungle trees to where he had first seen the goat.
There the bleating animal was. It had not moved.
"Surely that goat couldn't have given me the pain in my paw," said
Nero, between his howls. "I wonder what the goat means by staying in
one place so long, especially when it must know