ACROSS THE MAU ESCARPMENT 63 
way, that is destined on this very plateau, again and again, 
to baffle and confuse you. Within and around this reedy 
stronghold there are probably more lions to-day than 
anywhere else in Africa. On these countless herds of 
game they feed abundantly. At night they kill, and ear- 
liest dawn finds them where they are safe from any hunter, 
in their impenetrable papyrus stronghold. 
Far away on the horizon to the west, north, and east, 
the faint patchy beginnings of a sparsely wooded country 
are seen, but all round the rock the grass lies green, not 
even a bush growing anywhere. Here on this treeless 
greensward lions can rarely be stalked, but they can be 
“ridden” gloriously. 
Look carefully with your glasses over the plain, and 
well-defined paths show up. These the elephants have 
made, as they take a pleasant one-night excursion of thirty 
miles or so, from their two favourite forest haunts — 
from Elgon’s slopes on the west, to the far denser woods of 
Elgao and Cherangang. Sometimes they, unwisely for 
themselves, break the journey and linger by the way to eat 
the succulent shoots of the thorn trees that cover the lower 
slopes of the plain. Amid these low-growing trees the 
sportsman has the very best of good chances —cover, for 
a close approach, and some shelter, in case there is trouble. 
Standing on the summit, a good view is had into the 
basin of the little, brackish, well-hidden, Sergoit Lake. 
Troops of eland, herds of zebra, and Jackson’s hartebeest, 
in hundreds, troop down in the evening, to drink around 
the reedy margin of the water. Reed buck are always to 
be found, and a fine band of waterbuck seem to make their 
home in the little bit of broken ground, that lies just to the 
west of the water. A sportsman will leave game just here- 
abouts alone. If meat must be had, and by now your 
porters will surely be pestering you with cries of N’yama, 
bwana (meat, master), go a mile or two out of camp and 
