SEEKING ROMANTIC ADVENTURES. 67 



whose object was generally to steal their ivory or capture them- 

 selves. 



East Africa till very lately was in an awful plight. The curse 

 of age-long slavery and perpetual wars and cattle-raiding among 

 the tribes turned what should have been a prosperous country into 

 the darkest and most hopeless of lands, where every man distrusted 

 and feared his fellow. There was no rule, no central authority. 

 The strong consumed the weak. It was a region where rapine, 

 cruelty, and bloodshed perpetually reigned. 



The distance from one inhabited oasis to another was often 

 great. Vast tracts had been depopulated by native wars, pestilences, 

 or the slave trade. Safari, therefore, whether they were made up — 

 as were Somalis or Swahili exhibitions — for purposes of trade, or 

 for discovery or sport, had to be large; a march through much of 

 the country meant a little war, and every porter carried a gun in 

 addition to his pack. 



NATIVE DISTRUST AND DISCONTENT. 



So it came to pass often that, willingly or unwillingly, almost 

 every safari's progress tended but to increase the native distrust 

 and discontent and to add to the misery of the country it passed 

 through. 



The food question was ever the burning question — men carry- 

 ing trading goods into the interior couldn't carry a sufficient supply 

 of food as well. The limit of human endurance is reached at sixty 

 pounds the man. It takes a stout porter to carry that, day after 

 day, in the sun. Now that same porter eats in one month forty- 

 five pounds of his load, so it is at once evident he cannot carry food 

 and other things as well. 



It is needless to say that with the abolition of slavery, and far 

 more still with the introduction of protectorate rule by England, 

 rule that does most really attempt at least to protect the native, all 

 this has ceased. You are obliged to do a good deal for your safari — 

 often much more than local opinion deems necessary. 



The porter's wages are fixed. You cannot pay less, and for 

 this country they are high. The quality and quantity of food you 



