242 STALKS ABROAD 



and waited for his return. It was just as well we did 

 so, as Burton got laid up. The morning after our 

 arrival a party of Wa Kikuyu turned up bedaubed with 

 white paint and wearing feather head-dresses. They 

 made the most horrible noises and performed a kind of 

 dance. Many of them had small wooden shields on 

 their arms, and carried long sticks from which hung 

 strips of skin covered with the long hair of the colobus 

 monkey. The Masai and Wa Kikuyu youths are 

 circumcised at the age of nineteen. The ceremony 

 takes place once a year, and is followed by an 

 elaborate dance. The party who visited Fort Hall 

 were on their way to take part in these rites. Hence 

 their costume. 



We had discovered that the one thing wanting 

 to complete our happiness was a little music in the 

 evenings, so Burton with his usual kindness of heart 

 had ordered a gramophone. A few days later it 

 arrived. We rushed at the box, one of us fixed up 

 the machine whilst the other unearthed " Vilia," to be 

 succeeded by " Tobermory." Everything was ready, 

 the Commissioner was panting with excitement when 

 we discovered that the sound box had been forgotten. 

 However, two days later it arrived and Harry Lauder's 

 inimitable voice delighted our hearts. 



It was much warmer at Fort Hall than in the 

 highlands of Bumuruti and Nyeri, being 2000 feet 

 lower in altitude. There I slept under four thicknesses 

 of blanket, whilst at Fort Hall one was ample. 



Burton being quite recovered, on 23rd April we 



