284 AFRICA SPEAKS 



The Seira Nyiro had risen to flood proportions, but 

 we managed to ford it without injury to the motor. 

 At Baboon Crossing it required over two hours to pull 

 the truck across with a rope and then reload it. This 

 gave us something to worry about, because if the deep 

 Benogie Gorge was filled with water, we should be 

 marooned. As we rolled along, Mike told me about 

 the leopard he had shot the day before near Gurmeti 

 and of the three hons that had crossed the road at 

 Benogie. We found no lions at the Benogie Gorge, 

 but, instead, a swift torrent that leaped and roared 

 toward Victoria Nyanza, carrying huge logs and all 

 sorts of debris on its foaming crest. As it was over 

 forty feet deep, we erected our tent and prepared for 

 a long wait. Old Maniki then came forward and 

 offered to swim the river and take a note to Major 

 Warwick at Kjlimafeza, seven miles away. Finding 

 a bend where the water was not so turbulent, we 

 placed a rope around his waist and allowed him to try. 

 He proved to be a powerful swimmer, but was almost 

 knocked unconscious when he was thrown against the 

 opposite bank. However, he made it all right, and we 

 then threw him the note tied around a stone. Carry- 

 ing our S S, he disappeared from sight. 



Mike and I took a long walk, hoping to encounter 

 lions or leopards, but saw neither. We found many 

 dik-dik, reedbuck, water buck, zebra, and kongoni, 

 in addition to plenty of birds. Our food supplies were 

 practically exhausted, now consisting of one can of 

 beans and three onions. We poured the beans into 

 a frying pan and shced the onions in with them. Upon 

 this mixture, with the addition of whatever meat we 

 could eat without salt, we subsisted during our enforced 



