To gratify the monarch, hunters sought remote and savage districts, where the beast was still plentiful, and, trapping their prey, conveyed it many hundreds of miles to yield a momentary pleasure to the royal sportsman.
It is instructive to contrast with the boldness shown in the lion-hunts of this remote period the feelings and conduct of the present inhabitants of the region.

The Arabs, by whom it is in the main possessed, are a warlike race, accustomed from infancy to arms and inured to combat.

"Their hand is against every man, and every man's hand is against them." Yet they tremble if a lion is but known to be near, and can only with the utmost difficulty be persuaded by an European to take any part in the chase of so dangerous an animal.
The lioness, no less than the lion, appears as a beast of chase upon the sculptures.

It seems that in modern times she is quite as much feared as her consort.

Indeed, when she has laid up cubs, she is even thought to be actually the more dangerous of the two.