TICK-FEVER i75 



which the fever is so prevalent that it is difficult to 

 induce porters to travel through them. It is useless 

 to tell them that if they sleep in the old shelters 

 they will get fever ; they smile indulgently but in- 

 credulously at the crazy European, and unless they 

 are turned out of the old shelters and compelled to 

 make new ones, tick-bites and spirillum fever are 

 the speedy results. The Uganda Government has 

 ordered the destruction of the camp shelters along 

 the roads in the worst infected districts, and it is 

 hoped that in this way the disease will be kept 

 within bounds. 



In spite of all our precautions, Carruthers and I 

 fell victims to it and to malaria, and our designs 

 upon the big game near Vichumbi were frustrated. 

 It was bad enough to be fever-stricken both at the 

 same moment, but when our ' boys ' succumbed too, 

 and we had no one to do anything for us, we were 

 in a poor way indeed. Those ten days were a 

 perfect nightmare, and the few recollections that I 

 have of Vichumbi are among the least pleasant that 

 remain of our time in Africa. If one of us was 

 slightly better one day, the other was sure to be 

 worse, and there seemed to be every chance of our 

 remaining at Vichumbi for the rest of our natural 

 lives ; so a change of climate was decided on, and 

 we had hammocks made and ourselves carried 

 slowly and uncomfortably away from the pestilential 

 spot. 



It was a very grievous disappointment to us to 



