Now I shall tell you about the remaining habits of the lion, and how he lives every day.
Lion cubs at birth are usually twins or triplets. Sometimes four or even five cubs are born together; but then they are very difficult to rear, and one or two of them usually die. So a lioness has generally a family of two or three cubs to take care of. She brings them up in almost the same way that a tigress rears her cubs, as I have already described. The lioness feeds her cubs with her milk for about the first three months, and after that she gives them a little tender meat.
When the lion cubs are six months old, they are able to eat all kinds of meat and to follow their mother to hunt the prey. She teaches them the tricks of the jungle, just as the tigress teaches _her_ cubs.
So, by the time the lion cubs are about a year old, they can kill the prey by themselves. Their mother just looks on, and _criticizes_ their work! That is, she tells them if they have done their work well, or if they have done it badly! How does she tell them that? In this way:
If she is satisfied with their work, she does nothing in particular; she just joins the cubs in eating the prey after they have killed it. But if she is _not_ satisfied with the way in which they have caught or killed the prey, she cuffs them with her paw!
Hunters have actually observed lionesses doing that! And of course the lion cubs practice their lessons more thoroughly the next time. In the jungle, the children of animals do not need to be punished more than once or twice!
You will notice that I have said nothing about the cubs' _father_, the lion. I am sorry to say that the lion is not usually so good a father as the tiger is. You will remember that the tiger helps his wife to provide food for the children, and also to teach them the tricks of the jungle. A lion seldom does that; he usually deserts his family, and lets them take care of themselves.
A lion that does stay with his family, after the cubs are born, has usually more than one wife. In that respect also the tiger is far finer than the lion. A tiger has only _one wife_; and he takes care of her and the cubs. But when a lion does stay with his family, the family usually consists of two or three lionesses, who are his wives, and their cubs.