CHAPTER VI 



THE EAST SIDE OF RUWENZORI 



* A wanderer is man from his birth. 

 He was born in a ship 

 On the breast of the river of Time ; 

 Brimming with wonder and joy 

 He spreads out his arms to the light, 

 Rivets his gaze on the banks of the stream.' 



Matthew Arnold. 



The four members of the British Museum party 

 had arrived some three weeks earlier, and were 

 already well established when I joined them. The 

 spot selected for the camp was about as perfect a 

 one as could have been found. At the top of a 

 steep ridge between two narrow valleys, where the 

 ridge itself merged into the main valley wall, was a 

 tiny space, perhaps a quarter of an acre in extent, 

 of fairly level ground. On this space were three 

 native huts, the village of Bihunga, and the camp of 

 the expedition, which consisted of a large grass 

 hut, two or three lesser huts, and a few tents. 

 There was so little room to spare that if one had 

 tried to pitch another tent, it would assuredly have 

 fallen over the edge into one of the valleys below. 

 The natives were inclined to take alarm at the 

 advent of so many strangers, but they soon over- 



65 5 



