430 



AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 



rable to that of the little Arab-negro or Berber-negro sul- 

 tanates strung along the southern edge of the Sahara, and 

 contrasting sharply with the weltering savagery which 

 surrounded it, and which stretched away without a break 

 for many hundreds of miles in every direction. The peo- 

 ple were industrious tillers of the soil, who owned sheep, 



goats, and 

 some cattle; 

 they wore de- 

 cent clothing, 

 and hence 

 were styled 

 "womanish" 

 by the savages 

 of the Upper 

 Nile region, 

 who prided 

 themselves on 

 the nakedness 

 of their men 

 as a proof of 

 manliness; 

 they were un- 

 usually intelli- 

 gent and cer- 

 emoniously 

 courteous; 

 and, most sin- 

 gular of all, although the monarch was a cruel despot, of 

 the usual African (whether Mohammedan or heathen) type, 

 there were certain excellent governmental customs, of bind- 

 ing observance, which in the aggregate might almost be 

 called an unwritten constitution. Alone among the natives 

 of tropical Africa the people of Uganda have proved very 

 accessible to Christian teaching, so that the creed of Chris- 

 tianity is now dominant among them. For their good 

 fortune, England has established a protectorate over them. 



The Indian elephant at Entebbe 



The only possession of the white man that really appalls the natives, as they 

 know the wild elephant and cannot understand any one taming it and 

 making it ob~y. Even the railroad fails to compare with it. The mahout 

 is just mounting 



From a photograph by Kermit Roosevelt 



