194 THE GAME OF BRITISH EAST AFRICA. 



bring in supplies. In unadministrated countries lawless action on the part of 

 porters is apt to cause infinite trouble, and is a source of danger to the whole 

 caravan. 



When travelling through little-visited country natives may be hostile, but more 

 usually they run away at the sight of a white man and a large party. It then requires 

 great patience and tact to persuade them that your intentions are friendly and to 

 induce them to bring in supplies. The average native is frightened at the sight of 

 any other native of another tribe until he sees him run away, and then he suddenly 

 discovers what a brave fellow he is himself, and wants to rob and loot his adversary. 



The greatest vigilance has to be exercised to guard against your followers 

 helping themselves to the belongings of the flying inhabitants of a village, for the 

 language of the village native will most likely be strange, and even if you have an 

 interpreter he will as likely as not conceal any cases of theft reported. 



It is not only your own people who are offenders in this respect however, for a 

 native of the country is often every whit as bad. If you have any local guides with 

 you they will as likely as not take the opportunity of robbing their friends, for they 

 know that they will not be themselves suspected. Not long ago I killed an elephant, 

 after having followed its spoor to a spot which I imagined far from any village. The 

 time when I shot the animal was about four o'clock in the afternoon, so I then 

 returned to camp, walking for about two and a half hours. Next day I resolved to 

 camp by the elephant, so that I could exchange the meat for porters' food at some 

 village. I wanted to get to the kill before any natives got wind of it, so I made an 

 early start and reached the neighbourhood of the elephant about seven o'clock. Loud 

 wrangling and talking at once made me aware of the state of affairs, and creeping up 

 to the elephant I found a party of natives just clearing off, having made an absolutely 

 clean sweep of every atom of flesh. It turned out that there was a village 

 comparatively near, and the natives having heard my shots had set off to discover 

 the cause. Having found my elephant they camped by it all night, and cut it up and 

 were just making off, evidently not expecting my return so early. Directly they saw 

 me they bolted into the bush, leaving spears, bows, arrows, and knives lying about 

 in all directions. 1 was very annoyed, as meat was in that locality about the only 

 thing that it was possible to exchange for other food, and I had counted on this 

 elephant for the men's rations. The last elephant I had killed had been too far away 

 from villages for me to be able to effect an exchange, and so the natives had had the 

 meat for nothing. 



When the party bolted into the bush I managed to catch one poor old man 

 who was not so quick or slippery as his fellows. 1 then collected all the weapons 



