Showing Living Free; The story of Elsa and her cubs by Joy Adamson

Born Free will always remain one of the great animal stories, as an account of a friendship between man and beast it is unsurpassed; but it is also unfinished, The continuation of George and Joy Adamson's relationship with Elsa, from the time of her mating with a wild lion until her cubs were a year old, is now described in Living Free. When the Adamsons learnt that Elsa had mated in the autumn of 1959 there began a long period of suspense. Not only were they concerned for her safety during her pregnancy, but she finally vanished fbr a, number of days only to reappear without a trace of any cubs, It was another six weeks belore she did at last bring her family to be introduced to Joy. The three cubs soon developed distinctive characters. They were always led by Jespah, bold and mischievous, protective towards Elsa and playful with Joy. His brother Gopa was cautious by' comparison and inclined to be jealous; while their sister Little Elsa remained the wildest, of the three and the last to explore the camp and its tents. Not that the Adamsons encouraged the cubs to be familiar; on the con- trary, they wished them to grow up entirely free. But two constant and growing dangers made it impossible to leave them as they had planned. First the bush became riddled with poachers, some of whom threatened to kill Elsa. Secondly, a fierce lioness challenged her: territory and in a series of fights inflicted on Elsa a number of serious wounds" She was recovering from one of these battles when David Attenborough made his remarkable television film Sir Julian Huxley finds it not only more interesting, in many ways, than Born Free, but also valuable of science" It is illustrated with nearly 100 Black-and-white photographs and a dozen colour. The unique pictures of the cubs celebrating Christmas were taken only a few weeks before Elsa's tragic death.