THROUGH UNKNOWN AFRICAN COUNTRIES. 
1O 
friend, so that many of the animals were obliged to carry 
burdens weighing from two hundred and fifty to four hun- 
dred pounds, whereas they should not have averaged two 
hundred pounds, considering there was such a long journey 
ahead of us. I depended upon securing camels as I went 
inland to replace the number that were sure to become 
exhausted, and to continue buying until the total number 
amounted to one hundred and ten strong animals. 
To have made a long march across the broad maritime 
plain by day, with the pitiless, scorching rays of the sun 
beating down upon the over-burdened camels, would have 
been disastrous; so I arranged to start in the afternoon, 
and march throughout the night, forcing the camels ahead 
until we had gotten well up the first mountain ranges, and 
into a country where they could get a little food and a 
more refreshing climate. 
Somaliland may be roughly divided into three parts as 
regards elevation and climate. First the maritime plain, 
the evils of which it would be impossible to exaggerate ; 
then a broad plateau extending inland some thirty miles, 
at an elevation of 3,500 feet, where the atmosphere is dry 
and not uncomfortably hot; and after this the highlands, 
or second plateau, embracing all the central part of Somali- 
land, where the aneroid will register from 4,000 to 6,000 
feet above the sea level. 
Our object was, therefore, to reach the first plateau before 
the morning sun’s rays should strike us too heavily. By 
four o'clock in the afternoon the last camel load was ad- 
justed, and off the caravan started. 
In six hours we had reached the bottom of the first 
ascent. The boys, as well as the camels, were in a ridicu- 
lous state of exhaustion, being enervated by the long 
stay on the coast. Four of them were too sick to walk. 
The three Europeans, however, had an easy time of it, can- 
