1 98 THE REDISCOVERED COUNTRY 



knew themselves in the wrong and dodged here and 

 there, laughing considerably, and trying to dodge in 

 under my blows to get hold of their loads. This was 

 an easy matter, as I could not get around in very lively 

 fashion. Then they went off down the trail at double 

 quick time, and never offered to lay down a load imtil 

 the very end of the journey — a tremendous march. 

 It shows what they can do when they get to it. 



We saw many villages and houses perched up in the 

 hnis. At one place the people were just starting to put 

 up a new house. The skeleton of the roof was being 

 raised on the end of a centre pole, a good deal like a big 

 umbrella. After it was in place they proceeded to 

 fasten the sides beneath it. These people drive all 

 their flocks inside the houses at night. It must be 

 warm and cozy, to say the least ! Twenty or thirty 

 animals, a dozen human beings, no ventilation what- 

 ever, and a tropical climate! 



At last we stopped on the wide slope of the last hiU, 

 which dipped down to the Mara River and then grad- 

 ually up again to the escarpment twenty miles or so 

 away. It was one of those wide sweeping views pe- 

 culiar to our southwest and some parts of Africa, with 

 small slate-blue kopjes rising from milky distance, and 

 then the dark ranges. I made camp in the guest 

 camp of the village, or collection of villages belonging 

 to a sultan named Missambi. The main house had 

 no side walls, but instead a sort of picket fence half- 



