Lake Victoria to Khartoum 



Under a literary style which is all his own, 

 Captain Dickinson has a message to convey. It 

 is the interest and spirit of a genuine sportsman, 

 who knows how to find the game, how to kill, and 

 — much rarer quality — how to spare. 



He is fortunate in the countries in which his 

 service has lain. These great wild lands offer 

 to the young officer not only opportunities of 

 sport or adventure, but a contact with responsi- 

 bilities and realities which is a special education 

 in itself. Few return to the prosaic routine of 

 peace-time soldiering in England without new 

 qualities of knowledge and character, to com- 

 pensate them for the regrets with which they 

 look back, and often, alas, for the health they 

 leave behind them. Reading these pages brings 

 vividly back to me mellow and charming recollec- 

 tions of British East Africa and Uganda, two 

 years ago — the stir in camp before daybreak, 

 breakfast under the stars, the long tramp through 

 the dripping elephant grass while the sun rose 

 higher and higher and the thermometer bounded 

 up in company, the oases of rest in the " bandas " 

 with food and drink assuming totally new values, 

 the cool of the evening, and the long sittings 



vi 



