THE UNKNOWN LAND. 389 



air felt dry, the atmosphere was so clear that 

 a day's journey seemed usually but the mat- 

 ter of a few hours. Only rarely did we enjoy 

 a few moments of open travel. Most of the 

 time the thorns caught at us. In the mountain 

 passes were sometimes broad trails of game or 

 of the Masai cattle. The country was harsh 

 and dry and beautiful with the grays and dull 

 greens of arid-land brush, or with the soft at- 

 mospheric tints of arid-land distances. Game 

 was fairly common, but rather difficult to find. 

 There were many buffalo, a very few zebra, 

 leopards, hyenas, plenty of impalla, some sing- 

 sing, a few eland, abundant warthog, Thomp- 

 son's gazelle, and duiker. We never lacked for 

 meat when we dared shoot it, but we were 

 after nobler game. The sheep given us by 

 Naiokotuku followed along under charge of the 

 syces. 



When we should run quite out of meat, we in- 

 tended to eat them. We delayed too long, how- 

 ever. One evening the fool boy tied them to a 

 thorn bush; one of them pulled back, the 

 thorns bit, and both broke loose and departed 

 into the darkness. Of course everybody pur- 

 sued, but we could not recapture them. Ten 

 minutes later the hyenas broke into the most 



