CHAP. XVII I MASAI RAIDS 363 



a strong position has enabled a tribe to hold its own, as on a 

 rock, while the flood has swept by it and isolated it from its 

 fellows. Thus the Wa-kamba have been carried northward from 

 their old home in the Ugara country, and drawn into their 

 present position in the British protectorate ; while the Doko 

 of Laikipia and the Wa-ruguru of Kenya have been left in 

 their forest homes, surrounded by alien races. 



These national movements have in one way lessened the 

 scientific value and interest of the study of the African natives ; 

 for they have confused the racial characters and introduced 

 great uncertainty into the relationships of the tribes. They 

 compensate for this, however, by serving as a great object in 

 history, as we can now watch in progress before us a series 

 of national migrations, similar to those inroads of the bar- 

 barians which destroyed the Roman Empire. 



The movements in the present case are of two types ; the 

 Masai furnish an example of the one and the Somali of the 

 other. The Masai make continual raids from their main 

 kraals upon their neighbours, whom they distract and im- 

 poverish. At last, the position of these victims becomes 

 unendurable and they move away, leaving their oppressors free 

 to roam over the deserted district. 



The Masai raids in British East Africa are made from two 

 main centres — the district around Lake Naivasha, and the 

 region of Nyiri and Matumbato to the north of Kilima Njaro, 

 The raiding parties travel great distances, especially toward 

 the east. 



It is said that they used to go right up to Mombasa and 

 even send spies into the town to ascertain if caravans were 

 preparing to start for the interior. In 1889 they certainly 

 raided within sight of the harbour, and in 1888 they killed a 

 headman of Teleki's at the Mwachi river, only a day's march 

 from Mombasa. Whole tracts of the Giriama country, a few 

 miles north of the British East African capital, and almost 

 close to the sea, are still left uncultivated on account of their 

 liability to Masai attack. The extent and frequency of the 

 raids are shown in Fig. 22, in which are marked the principal 

 war-paths, and the localities where the doings of this tribe 

 came under my personal observation, between February and 

 August 1893. South of Merifano on the Tana, Harris and I 



