MY SOMALI BOOK 9 



varying opinions ; contact Avith civilisation certainly 

 does not seem to improve him — as witness the parti- 

 cularly objectionable type that thrives, spite of many 

 discouragements, in Aden. Even in his own country, 

 so far as my experience goes, those who knew him best 

 often like him least. He is extremely avaricious ; he 

 is vanity itself ; he does not know the meaning of 

 gratitude ; he is the embodiment of laziness ; he is 

 an unmitigated Har ; he is an accomplished thief ; 

 and he is careless and casual to a degree. These are 

 some of the indictments, and I fear there is much of 

 truth in all of them. 



Is there something, I wonder, in the atmosphere of 

 the Gulf of Aden that conduces to the growth of avarice ? 

 Shylock was a Jew of Venice, and I have known of 

 Indian money-lenders whose thoroughness in the art 

 of skinning a victim was' — if thoroughness be a virtue 

 in itself — worthy of all praise. But for sheer unadul- 

 terated greed commend me to a Somali or a petty 

 Arab Sheikh of the Aden Hinterland. 



And, while the climate of Aden has been painted 

 in blacker lines than it really deserves, it is said with 

 possible truth that after long residence there the 

 white man deteriorates — in his attitude towards the 

 root of all evil as in other things. And certainly I 

 knew a man — but I mustn't tell tales out of Somali- 

 land ! To return to our Somali : there is another 

 and more pleasing side to his picture. Colonel H. G. 

 Swayne — and few know him so well — writes : " The 

 Somali ... is generally a good camel-man, a cheerful 

 camp-follower, a trustworthy, loyal and attentive 

 soldier ; proud of the confidence reposed in him, quick 



