With Flashlight and Rifle ^ 



The reverses of fortune, for which every traveller must 

 be prepared, will now perhaps begin to come about. The 

 tsetse-tly stings and kills the animals which have been 

 brought along for riding, and a number of the pack-mules ; 

 they and the cattle succumb to all sorts of epidemics. 

 But it is even worse when we are obliged to traverse 

 regions in which small-pox, lor example, has followed in 

 the wake of famine. 



In the year 1899 I was obliged to go through localities 

 in which the " ndui "" had reio-ned. About three weeks 

 afterwards, I noticed one day in camp that there was on 

 my left hand a little dark ulcer — an inflammation, I was 

 sure, which had been caused by some arsenic-like quality 

 in the stuft used for taxidermy. 



I showed it to my taxidermist, Orgeich. " I will tell 

 the Herr what that is. That's the black pock." When I 

 asked him why he thought so. he told me without circum- 

 locution that tor some days a carrier, very ill indeed with 

 small-pox, had been in camp. " I would not frighten the 

 Herr," he told me laconically ; and that was his only 

 reason lor havinof made no communication to me about 

 this sickness ! 



This announcement — made in the Rhenish dialect — was 

 anvthinor but ac^reeable to me. I then ascertained that there 

 really was a native covered all over with small-pox. Of 

 course I had him isolated and put in a thorn-enclosure by 

 the river, impenetrable to beasts of prey ; and, surprisingly 

 enough, there was no other appearance of the disease in 

 the caravan. When a doctor, later on, examined the 

 patient (who was then cured), he confirmed my diagnosis. 



654 



