Al-Matalib al-'Aliyah 4060 — The virtue of Safinah

It is narrated from Sayyiduna Safinah (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: "I was aboard a ship at sea when it broke apart, so I climbed onto one of its planks, which carried me on the waves and cast me into a thicket (a dense forest) where there was a lion. Suddenly finding it before me, I was terrified, so I addressed it and said: O Abu al-Harith, I am Safinah, the freed slave of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him). The narrator says: Upon hearing this, the lion touched me with its shoulder and lowered its head (in humility), and it began to guide me along the way, nudging me with its shoulder. Then it kept walking with me until it set me on the (village) road. Then it gestured with its paw (hand) and for a while made its peculiar low muffled sound, from which I understood that it was bidding me farewell."
Musnad Abi Ya'la: 4060, Musnad al-Bazzar: 4060; Imam Abu Ya'la and Imam al-Bazzar recorded it through the chain of Uthman bin Umar.