318 TO THE UASIN GISHU [ch. xii 



dying beast at close quarters, and killed it just as it was 

 gathering itself to spring at him. 



Thence they went to Nakuru, where Kermit killed 

 two Neuman's hartebeest. They were scarce and wild, 

 and Kermit obtained his two animals by long shots, 

 after following them for hours — following them until, 

 as he expressed it, they got used to him, became a little 

 less quick to leave, and gave him his chance. 



A'Miile on this trip Kermit passed his twentieth 

 birthday. While still nineteen he had killed all the 

 dangerous kinds of African game — lion, leopard, 

 elephant, buffalo, and rhino. 



Heller also rejoined us, entirely recovered. He had 

 visited JMearns and Loring at their camp high up on 

 Mount Kenia, where they had made a thorough 

 biological survey of the mountain. He had gone to 

 the line of perpetual snow, where the rock peak rises 

 abruptly from the swelling downs, and had camped 

 near a little glacial lake, whose waters froze every night. 

 The zones of plant and animal life were well marked ; 

 but there are some curious differences between the zones 

 on these equatorial African snow mountains and those 

 on similar mountains in the northern hemisphere, espe- 

 cially America. In the high mountains of Nortli 

 America the mannnals are apt to be, at least in part, 

 of totally different kinds from those found in the 

 adjacent warm or hot plains, because they represent a 

 fauna which was once spread over the land, but which 

 has retreated northward, leaving faunal islands on the 

 summits of the taller mountains. In this part of Africa, 

 however, there has been no faunal retreat of this type, 

 no survivals on the peaks of an ancient fauna, which in 

 the plains and valleys has been replaced by another 

 fauna. Here the mammals of the high mountains and 



