I am a lion, and I live in the Tropical Regions of India. I roam about in the forests, in search of my prey. I eat bullocks, and sheep in my younger days, but when I get old I lose all my theet and am unable to eat the tough flesh of a bullock. I then have to live near a town, and eat one of the children as it is going or coming to school. I eat all the flesh, the bones being the only remnants for any trace of the child. I am then called a man eating lion. I am the strongest of all animals, therefore I am called the “King of Beasts”. I have a mane which is very long. My head is the strongest part of my body, the same as the mole. I am sometimes hunted, but not as much as the lioness, or the tiger. I am brown in colour, and have very sharp claws. A true story goes, that a lion was limping along with a thorn in its foot, and a man named Androcles saw it and thought that it would instantly tear him to pieces, but to his astonishment it calmly held put its paw. Androcles examined it and took out the thorn, and went away. Sometimes afterwards Androcles was captured, because of his religion, and put itnto the den with a lion in it. The lion took no notice of him, but left him stroke it. The torturers, seing that the lione would not touch hime let him free. Androcles then thought that it was the lion which he doctored, and took the torn from its foot. I was the lion which was punt in the den, and I heard that I was to be put to death for disobedience, but I escaped into the desert and I followed and protected him from the dangers of the desert.
MYSELF AS A LION
United Kingdom, 5 May 1914
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