TO NAIVASHA AFTER DUCK 



AND SNIPE 



ONE fine day, having made the necessary 

 preparations in the shape of tents, cart- 

 ridges, food, and the hundred and one 

 things that appertain to duck-shooting 

 — old boots, warm socks in heaps, sweaters, and 

 the ordinary impedimenta that one cannot travel 

 without — three of us seated ourselves at Nairobi 

 station in the up train for Lake Naivasha. 



It was a warm day in August, the nth to 

 be exact, as duck-shooting on Naivasha opens 

 the next day, and having settled down in the 

 comfortable carnage we proceeded to while away 

 the time, whilst the train crawled up to the top 

 of the Kikuyu escarpment overlooking the Great 

 Rift Valley, with a novel and a whisky and soda. 

 Higher and higher crept the train, at first through 

 the cultivated land round Limoru, further and 

 further till it reached the summit, winding its way 

 through the cedar forests at the top of the range ; 

 and then a magnificent vista of mountain, forest, 

 and plain, many thousands of feet below, broke 

 on our eyes. 



" But how in the world are we going to get 



223 



