Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Androclus

ANDROCLUS, a Roman slave who used to lead about the streets a lion that had forborne to injure him when turned loose upon him in the circus. The story is related, on the authority of an eye-witness, by Aulus Gellius (Noct. Att., v. 14), who states that Androclus, having taken refuge from the severities of his master in a cave in Africa, a lion entered the cave and presented to him his swollen paw, from which Androclus extracted a large thorn.