NOTES ON THE MASAI. 345 



recuperate. The blood and milk are then shaken 

 together in long gourds. Certainly the race 

 seems to thrive on this strange diet. Only rarely, 

 on ceremonial occasions or when transportation 

 is difficult, do they eat mutton or goat flesh, but 

 never beef. 



Of labour, then, about a Masai village, it 

 follows that there is practically none. The 

 women build the manyattas ; there is no cook- 

 ing, no tilling of the soil, no searching for wild 

 fruits. The herd have to be watched by day, 

 and driven in at the fall of night ; that is the 

 task of the boys and the youths who have not 

 gone through with the quadriennial circumcision 

 ceremonies and become El-morani, or warriors. 

 Therefore the grown men are absolutely and 

 completely gentlemen of leisure. In civilization, 

 the less men do the more important they are 

 inclined to think themselves. It is so here. 

 Socially the Masai consider themselves several 

 cuts above anybody else in the country. As 

 social superiority lies mostly in thinking so hard 

 enough so that the inner belief expresses itself 

 in the outward attitude and manner the Masai 

 carry it off. Their haughtiness is magnificent. 

 Also they can look as unsmiling and bored as 

 anybody anywhere. Consequently they are either 



