THROUGH THE PLEISTOCENE 23 



always been carried on. The backbone of such a safari is 

 generally composed of Swahili, the coast men, negroes who 

 have acquired the Moslem religion, together with a partially 

 Arabicized tongue and a strain of Arab blood from the 

 Arab warriors and traders who have been dominant in the 

 coast towns for so many centuries. It was these Swahili 

 trading caravans, under Arab leadership, which, in their 

 quest for ivory and slaves, trod out the routes which the 



up in line to greet us 



fifteen askaris, the second the porters with their headmen 



by Edmund Heller 



early white explorers followed. Without their work as a 

 preliminary the work of the white explorers could not have 

 been done; and it was the Swahili porters themselves who 

 rendered this work itself possible. To this day every hunter, 

 trader, missionary, or explorer must use either a Swahili 

 safari or one modelled on the Swahili basis. The part 

 played by the white-topped ox wagon in the history of South 

 Africa, and by the camel caravan in North Africa, has been 

 played in middle Africa by the files of strong, patient, 

 childlike savages, who have borne the burdens of so many 

 masters and employers hither and thither, through and 

 across, the dark heart of the continent. 



