168 AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 



our double-barrels in our hands, for it was a dangerous 

 neighborhood. Again and again we heard lions, and twice 

 one accompanied us for some distance, grunting occasion- 

 ally, while we kept the men closed. Once the porters were 

 thrown into a panic by a succession of steam-engine-like 

 snorts on our left, which announced the immediate proxim- 

 ity of a rhino. They halted in a huddle while Tarlton and 

 I ran forward and crouched to try to catch the great beast's 

 loom against the sky-line; but it moved off. Four miles 

 from camp was a Masai kraal, and we went toward this 

 when we caught the gleam of the fires; for the porters were 

 getting exhausted. 



The kraal was in shape a big oval, with a thick wall of 

 thorn-bushes, eight feet high, the low huts standing just 

 within this wall, while the cattle and sheep were crowded into 

 small bomas in the centre. The fires gleamed here and there 

 within, and as we approached we heard the talking and 

 laughing of men and women, and the lowing and bleating 

 of the pent-up herds and flocks. We hailed loudly, explain- 

 ing our needs. At first they were very suspicious. They 

 told us we could not bring the lion within, because it would 

 frighten the cattle, but after some parley consented to our 

 building a fire outside, and skinning the animal. They 

 passed two brands over the thorn fence, and our men 

 speedily kindled a blaze, and drew the lioness beside it. 

 By this time the Masai were reassured, and a score of 

 their warriors, followed soon by half a dozen women, 

 came out through a small opening in the fence, and 

 crowded close around the fire, with boisterous, noisy good 

 humor. They showed a tendency to chaff our porters. 

 One, the humorist of the crowd, excited much merriment 



