14 PREPARING FOR THE START part i 



sighted the sandhills of Sheila at the entrance to the harbour 

 of Lamu. The Malda anchored a couple of miles from the 

 shore to wait for the turn of the tide. The mails were sent ashore 

 at once, and our chief went ashore with them to arrange for 

 the disembarkation of the stores. He asked me to accompany 

 him, and Mr. Piggott came with us and introduced us to 

 Mr. Rogers, the superintendent of the district, his assistant, Mr. 

 Macquarie, and Mr. Bird Thompson, the officer in command of 

 the Indian troops at Witu, who was then staying at Lamu. 

 The Malda entered the port in the evening, as the captain 

 thought it prudent to wait till high tide before he threaded the 

 channels between the reefs which constitute the harbour bar. 



First thing next morning we set to work to unload the 300 

 tons of stores. The Somali worked well, with great energy 

 and much noise ; but their muscles proved weaker than their 

 will or their voice. The Turks, on the other hand, were quiet 

 and sluggish but immensely strong, and most of the heavy 

 work had to be left to them. The Somali, however, made up 

 in numbers and enthusiasm for their individual weakness, so 

 between the two contingents of men the transhipment of the 

 goods into dhows was finished early in the afternoon. We said 

 farewell to our kind friends on board the Malda, and followed 

 the men ashore. We landed close by the custom-house ; the 

 men paraded in the square in front of the old Portuguese fort 

 (see PI. II.), and then, under the guidance of one of Mr. 

 Rogers's Askari, marched to a cocoa-nut grove about a mile 

 to the west of the town. There camp was pitched around a 

 bungalow in a hollow in the sandhills, near some brackish wells 

 upon the shore. During the morning the Juba, a small steamer 

 belonging to the Sultan of Zanzibar, called in on its way to 

 Kismayu. So our chief seized the opportunity, and hastily 

 made an agreement with one of the leading Hindu traders of 

 Lamu for the supply of 1 1 o camels and 40 donkeys. The 

 trader's agent left at once in the Juba to purchase them. The 

 price agreed on was a very high one. But the contract stipu- 

 lated that they were all to be delivered in Lamu in a month's 

 time, and it was verbally promised that they should be landed 

 in three weeks. 



As we could not move from the coast until the camels came, 

 we settled in camp to prepare the equipment, drill the men, and 



