MIDDAY SUN

September on the Serengeti Plains. Months without rain and the sun beating down relentlessly day after day until the grass turns white and yellow and dry as tinder. The previous year rain poured down and great herds of wildebeests invaded the plains to eat the fresh grass. Perhaps stimulated by such overabundance of food, the lion population had grown. Now the herds have moved on, leaving behind the hungry predators and their young to endure the drought. The lioness and her two surviving cubs rest and pant in the midday heat, giving emphatic meaning to the phrase, "only the strong survive."