ELEPHANT-GRASS 45 



walking in single file there is only one very narrow 

 track, often more like a gutter than a track, where 

 one can walk, and this meanders like a cow from side 

 to side of the road, and is always ready to trip up 

 the booted traveller, who walks on rather a wider 

 base. On either side of the road is a dense growth 

 of tall elephant-grass, or ' mateitei,' which grows from 

 10 to 15 feet in height, and effectually blocks out 

 any view of the surrounding country. Much as he 

 loves and admires all things that grow out of the 

 earth, I do not think that even Sir Harry Johnston 

 could find a good word to say for elephant-grass. It 

 is the ugliest and the rankest and the hottest form 

 of vegetation I have ever met, and in countries 

 where there are not, as in Uganda, broad roads, but 

 one has to walk along the native path, a tunnel a 

 few inches wide, the horrid stuff is constantly hitting 

 you in the face, knocking your hat ofT, and pulling 

 your pipe out of your mouth, until you wonder why 

 you were ever fool enough to leave home. But, 

 like many other disagreeable things, it has one com- 

 pensating feature : it shows that the soil is good, and 

 where there is elephant-grass there is probably 

 abundant food for yourself and your porters. 



In the districts where elephant-grass is happily 

 absent, the road will be bordered with short grass — 

 that is to say, not more than waist-high — with a 

 beautiful mixture of flowering plants, sunflowers, 

 coreopsis, orchids, a little prickly aloe with a scarlet 

 flower, and a hundred others. These flower-gardens 



