CH. XIV] COLOBUS MONKEYS 425 



feet high, the close-growing stems knit together by 

 vines. As we drifted down, the green wall was con- 

 tinually broken by openings, through which side streams 

 from the great river rushed, swirling and winding, down 

 narrow lanes and under low archways, into the dim 

 mysterious heart of the vast reed-beds, where dwelt 

 bird and reptile and water beast. In a shallow bay we 

 came on two hippo cows with their calves, and a dozen 

 crocodiles. I shot one of the latter — as I always do, 

 when I get a chance — and it turned over and over, 

 lashing with its tail as it sank. A half-grown hippo 

 came up close by the boat and leaped nearly clear of 

 the water ; and in another place I saw a mother hippo 

 swimming, with the young one resting half on its back. 

 j Another day Kermit came on some black and white 

 Colobus monkeys. Those we had shot east of the Rift 

 ! Valley had long mantles, and more white than black in 

 their colouring ; west of the Rift \^alley they had less 

 (Wiiite and less of the very long hair ; and here on the 

 Nile the change had gone still farther in the same 

 direction. On the w^est coast this kind of monkey is 

 said to be entirely black. But we were not prepared 

 for the complete change in habits. In East Africa the 

 Colobus monkeys kept to the dense, cool, mountain 

 forests, dwelt in the tops of the big trees, and rarely 

 'descended to the ground. Here, on the Nile, they 

 lived in exactly such country as that affected by the 

 I smaller greenish-yellow monkeys, which we found along 

 'the Guaso Nyero for instance — country into which the 

 jEast African Colobus never by any chance wandered. 

 Moreover, instead of living in the tall timber, and never 

 i going on the ground except for a few yards, as in East 

 I Africa, here on the Nile they sought to escape danger 

 by flight over the ground, in the scrub. Kermit found 



