272 THE LAND: OF THE DION 
is, a formidable weapon. With it they do kill lions. To 
this fact the fine lion head-dresses worn by the warriors 
are quite sufficient proof. But since the white man has 
taken over the country, the Massai seem to prefer leaving 
lion killing to him, and the coveted head-gear is generally 
an old one, and not worn nearly as commonly as heretofore. 
One of the government officers stationed among the Nandi 
tells me that these natives still face the lion resolutely in 
defence of their flocks; and not rarely skins are brought 
in of spear-killed lions. Our Somali say that before the 
British occupation of Somali land, they had in self-defence 
to combine to kill a lion, when once he had tasted human 
flesh. ‘That as soon as sucha beast appeared in a neighbour- 
hood, all the men were commandeered by the chiefs and 
that on horseback, armed with spears, they hunted it down, 
be the cost what it might; otherwise the villages would 
have been uninhabitable. They added, however, that 
since the white man came lions are much fewer. All 
over the Guasi Nyiro country lions can be found, but when 
the white farmer, and more especially the white herdsman, 
comes in they soon disappear, for he very properly poisons 
them. It is so in every wild land. As soon as the little 
mountain streams of our own Rockies were used for 
irrigation, and the mountain slopes were chosen as pasturage 
for small, well watched herds of valuable beef cattle, the 
grizzly disappeared, and with him the’ gray timber wolf. 
By the same ignoble means the lion is doomed to pass. 
Along the banks of the Guasi Narok, especially on 
the northern left hand bank, the going is stony. Thorny 
scattered scrub comes down to the river’s edge, yet we 
found some delightful camping places where the grass 
was green, and where wide-spreading thorn trees threw 
a grateful shade. ‘The river is full of fish and its water 
deliciously clear and cool. To find such a stream is so 
rare in Africa that no camp near it can be a poor one. 
