AFRICAN CAMP FIRES 



Our way now led along the wide flat between the 

 seashore and the Shimba Hills in which we had been 

 hunting. A road ten feet wide and innocent of 

 wheels ran with obstinate directness up and down 

 the slight contours and through the bushes and 

 coconut groves that lay in its path. So mathe- 

 matically straight was it that only when perspective 

 closed it in, or when it dropped over the summit of 

 a little rise, did the eye lose the eff'ect of its inter- 

 minability. The country through which this road 

 led was various — open bushy veldt with sparse 

 trees, dense jungle, coconut groves, tall and cool. 

 In the shadows of the latter were the thatched native 

 villages. To the left always ran the blue Shimba 

 Hills; and far away to the right somewhere we heard 

 the grumbling of the sea. 



Every hundred yards or so we met somebody. 

 Even this early the road was thronged. By far the 

 majority were the almost naked natives of the 

 district, pleasant, brown-skinned people with good 

 features. They carried things. These things varied 

 from great loads balanced atop to dainty impromptu 

 baskets woven of coco-leaves and containing each a 

 single coconut. They smiled on us, returned our 

 greeting, and stood completely aside to let us pass. 

 Other wayfarers were of more importance. Small 

 groups of bearded dignitaries, either upper-class 



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