AND THE RUDOLF BASIN 7 



The traveller from ^Mombasa before reaching the frontier of the Uganda 

 Protectorate has pas&ed through the country of Kikuvu. which is relatively 

 well forested, while the ground is richl}^ clothed with vegetation. As he 

 descends into the Kift Valley, the Kikuyu vegetation decreases in luxuriance, 

 and a very prominent feature is a particularly ugly form of dracjena 

 (a kind of tree-lily), with stiff sword-leaves of sickly yellow-green. 

 The mass of Longonot and the distant outline of the Suswa crater already 

 referred to are imposing objects, but present very little vegetation with 

 which to diminish the desert-like appearance of the scene. Towards the 

 south end of l.ake Naivasha there are many isolated pinnacles and fragments 

 of rock. Along the western shores of Naivasha the vegetation becomes 

 much richer, especially on the steep slopes of the Mau Plateau edge. All 

 along tlie eastern borders of the lake there is sweet, short grass, kept low 

 by the browsing of innumerable gazelles and the herds of Masai sheep 

 and cattle. Near Naivasha station the Kikuyu Escarpment, descending in 

 a series of terraces, terminates abruptly in precipitous cliffs on the edges 

 of which huge boulders and monoiyths are [)oised. The shores of Naivasha 

 are in many places thickly belted with papyrus, which is growing at an 

 altitude (6,300 feet) and in a mean temperature not usually associated with 



5. STEAM KlSlNc; KliO.M l-'ISSf KK. Kl. lilKKO 



