4i8 ON SAFARI IN SOTIK WILDERNESS AND LAKE NAIVASHA 



night. While more comfortable, this was more difficult, and would 

 not have been attempted but that it was the period of a full moon and 

 Luna lighted their bushy path with her mild rays. The party rested 

 during the hotter period of the day, covered, as they lay on the ground, 

 with their overcoats and blankets. This was necessary to save them 

 from the attacks of the multitudinous insects that hunted the hunters 

 with insatiable appetite. 



That Colonel Roosevelt lost no time, but kept himself and those 

 with him incessantly active, need not be reiterated. On June 4th, the 

 day before setting out for Sotik, he visited the local station of the 

 African Inland Mission and made one of his characteristic speeches, 

 in which he warmly lauded the work of the mission. During the morn- 

 ing he had been in the field with his comrades in search of monkeys, 

 the chief prizes on this occasion falling to Mr. Heller, the naturalist 

 of the expedition, who bagged three Colobus and one green-faced 

 monkey. Kermit Roosevelt won two Colobi as his share of the game. 



When the Sotik district was reached, after their tramp through 

 the waterless wilderness, the hunters found themselves in a well- 

 watered region and one abundantly supplied with wild game. It was 

 a land of grassy meadows and clumps of forest, interlaced by streams, 

 its inhabitants being a tribe calling themselves the Kisii, a warlike but 

 good-natured and intelligent race of blacks. Their industry consisted 

 in farming, which they practiced with skill and success. 



In this district and the adjacent one of Guasi Niryiso the hunters 

 met with gratifying success, game being abundant. The much-desired 

 white rhinoceros, however, was not in evidence, though they sought 

 for it over many miles of country. At a later date, however, they got 

 all the specimens desired of this rare beast. 



Their experience in these hunting grounds was much like that 

 around Nairobi and need not be given in detail. It will suffice to say 

 in general that wild beasts fell in goodly numbers and wide variety 

 before their death-dealing weapons, and important additions were 

 made to the tributes to science obtained for the Smithsonian and 

 National Museums. 



On June 22d camp was made on the Loretta Plains and before 

 that day ended Colonel Roosevelt had added another lion to his score. 



