THE FOURTH OF JULY IN AFRICA. 28 
were heartily pleased when, late in the afternoon, we reached 
camp, after a long day’s work without any food, and full 
of excitement. This was the Fourth of July in Africa; 
and what a Fourth it had been, with plenty of guns 
fired! I still had with me six quart bottles of cham- 
pagne, that I had been keeping in case of sickness; but 
one of these must certainly be opened on the Fourth 
of July, and the American flag hoisted! Abdulla cooked 
us an excellent dinner, and later in the evening some of 
the boys entertained Dodson and myself to a Somali 
dance. 
The moon came out brightly, and as I sat outside my 
tent, late into the night, smoking cigarettes, and thinking 
of my good friends at home, and of the youngsters with 
their fire-crackers, I was suddenly aroused by the sound of 
a calf calling its mother. The natives had evidently been 
afraid I would kill the two Amar prisoners I had with me, 
and had brought the calf which they had stolen close to 
the camp. The little animal was soon with its mother 
inside the zareba, and now there remained but three stolen 
sheep that had not been returned. After seeing that the 
sentries were attending to their duty, I fired one shot from 
my elephant-gun to wind up the “ Fourth,” and then went 
to bed to enjoy a sleep that is known only to those living 
in the open air. 
The next morning we marched south for an hour and a 
half along a dry tug, until we came to a rapidly flowing 
stream about twenty yards wide and from six inches to two 
feet in depth. I forced the two Amar thieves to walk 
ahead with me, tied close to each other by a rope around 
their necks, but they insisted that there was no road what- 
ever for us. 
The stream was flowing southwest, and evidently emp- 
tied into Lake Rudolf; and the jungle on each side of it 
