THE SEFARI 39 
He is doing a job that Africa, his native land calls on him 
to do, and he is proud of it, and does it extraordinarily 
well. Anyone who has marched with him as I have, 
for more than five thousand miles, cannot readily accept 
much of the cheap current talk about the worthlessness 
of native labour. In more than a year’s sefari work I 
only had one man steal from me, and I have, on the other 
hand, to remember countless deeds of unselfish kindliness. 
Before leaving my Wanyamwazi porters, I must find 
space to tell of his day of modest triumph. As the sefari 
prolongs its journey, he reaches a pitch of raggedness 
that I will not venture to attempt to describe, much less 
photograph, but this perambulating bundle of rags, that 
reminds you of a caddis worm, is capable of a veritable 
transformation. Grub turning into butterfly never worked 
it more deftly. On the morning of the day when, proudly 
led by the chief porter, who carries the heaviest load, or 
the biggest tusk, the phalanx at last marches in from its 
long journey, then open your eyes wide, for if you do not 
you will not recognize your own men. From some mys- 
terious hiding place a new suit of some sort is forthcoming. 
His duty loin cloth has given place to a snowy pair of draw- 
ers. He has a new coat. He has invented somehow a 
new hat, or, if that is beyond even his resources, he has an 
ostrich feather, or a zebra tail, or a fluffy head covering 
of white marabou down, which he cunningly and with 
much rakish taste, fixes on his black pate. He feels bound 
to do honour to himself, the sefari and his bwana. 
I generally made it a point while on the march, to keep 
near the sefari. JI found in many ways the habit paid 
well. I got to know the men, and they came to know me, 
and to get good work from any man, he must be sympa- 
thized with and known. The East African can, I am 
convinced, be led far, but the man that would lead him 
must take some trouble to know him. In such a little 
