Barbus demantled that I should at least take a few gulps of wine since, he assured me, nothing really hurts if one has enough wine in one’s stomach. I drank and made my friends swear that they would hold the net firmly and not let it go at any price. Then I gripped my spear with both hands, clenched my teeth and crept along the lion’s path through the cleft in the rocks. With the thunder of the lion’s snores in my ears, I made out its recumbent form in the cave. I waved the spear, heard the lion let out a roar, myself gave a yell and ran, more swiftly than I had ever done at an athletic competition, straight into the net, which my friends had hastily raised without waiting for me to jump over it.
As I struggled for my life in the meshes of the net, the lion came hesitantly and groaning out of its cave and stopped in surprise to look at me. It was such a huge and fearsome beast that my friends, unable to bear the sight of it, dropped the net and fled. The animal trainer bawled out his good advice and shouted that we must at once cast the net over the lion before it became used to the daylight, for otherwise it might turn dangerous.
Barbus also shouted and urged me to show presence of mind and remember I was a Roman and a Manilian. If I found myself in need, he would immediately come down and kill the lion with his sword, but first I should try to capture it alive. I do not know which part of this advice seemed the soundest, but once my friends had dropped the net, it was easier for me to get out of it. Despite everything, their cowardice had made me so angry that I turned with a firm grip on the net and looked the lion straight in the eye. It stared back at me with a majestic mien and a deeply offended and hurt expression, whining gently as it lilted a bleeding hind paw. I raised the net with both hands, hoisted it tip will all my strength, for it was heavy for a single man, and threw it. The lion simultaneously took a leap forward, became entangled in the net and fell to one side. Roaring terribly, it began to roll about on the ground, winding the net around itself so that only once did it manage to strike me with its paw. I felt its strength, for I flew head-over-heels for quite a distance, a fact which undoubtedly saved my life.
Barbus and the animal trainer loudly urged each other on, the latter taking his wooden pitchfork and pinning the lion to the ground, and Barbus successfully threading a noose around its hind legs. Now the Syrian peasants tried to come to our rescue, but I shouted and swore and forbade them to since I wanted my cowardly friends to be in on the capture of the lion. Otherwise the whole of our plan would have been to no avail. Finally they did this,
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although they received several scratches from the lion’s claws in the process. The animal trainer secured our ropes and knots until the lion was so firmly bound that it could scarcely move. While this was going on, I sat on the ground, trembling with rage and so upset that I vomited between my knees.
The Syrian peasants threaded a long wooden pole between the lion’s paws and began to carry the creature toward the village. As it hung there on the pole, it seemed less large and majestic than when it had stepped out from its cave into the sunlight. In fact, it was a weak and flea-bitten old lion with several bald patches in its mane, and badly worn teeth. What worried me most was that it might be strangled by its bonds during the journey to the village.
My voice betrayed me several times, but I managed to make perfectly clear to my friends what I thought of them and their behavior. If I had learned anything, it was that one could rely on no one when it came to one’s life. My friends were ashamed of their behavior and accepted my criticism, but they also reminded me of our joint oath and that we had captured the lion together. They willingly allowed me the greater part of the honor, but also demonstrated their wounds. I, in turn, showed my arm, which was still bleeding so profusely that my knees felt weak. Finally we agreed that we were all scarred for life by our venture. In the village we celebrated with a feast and respectfully made sacrifices to the lion after we had successfully barricaded it inside the sturdy cage. Barbus and the animal trainer got drunk while the girls in the village danced in our honor and garlanded us. The following day we hired an ox-wagon to take the cage and we ourselves rode behind in procession with wreaths on our foreheads, while carefully ensuring that our bandages bore clearly visible bloodstains on them.
At the city gates in Antioch the police were about to arrest us and take away our horses, but the officer in command was wiser and decided to come with us when we told him that we were voluntarily on our way to the City Hall to give ourselves up. Two policemen made a way for us with their batons, for as always in Antioch, all the loafers began to crowd around as soon as word spread that something unusual had happened. At first the crowd shouted abuse and threw lumps of manure and rotten fruit at us, for an exaggerated rumor had circulated that we had violated all the girls and gods in the city. Irritated by the noise and cries of the crowd, our lion began to roar dully, and it continued to roar, encouraged by the sound of its own voice, until our horses once again began to rear and shy away.
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