THE SEFARI 39 



He is doing a job that Africa, his native land calls on him 

 to do, and he is proud of it, and does it extraordinarily 

 well. Anyone who has marched with him as I have, 

 for more than five thousand miles, cannot readily accept 

 much of the cheap current talk about the worthlessness 

 of native labour. In more than a year's sefari work I 

 only had one man steal from me, and I have, on the other 

 hand, to remember countless deeds of unselfish kindliness. 



Before leaving my Wanyamwazi porters, I must find 

 space to tell of his day of modest triumph. As the sefari 

 prolongs its journey, he reaches a pitch of raggedness 

 that I will not venture to attempt to describe, much less 

 photograph, but this perambulating bundle of rags, that 

 reminds you of a caddis worm, is capable of a veritable 

 transformation. Grub turning into butterfly never worked 

 it more deftly. On the morning of the day when, proudly 

 led by the chief porter, who carries the heaviest load, or 

 the biggest tusk, the phalanx at last marches in from its 

 long journey, then open your eyes wide, for if you do not 

 you will not recognize your own men. From some mys- 

 terious hiding place a new suit of some sort is forthcoming. 

 His duty loin cloth has given place to a snowy pair of draw- 

 ers. He has a new coat. He has invented somehow a 

 new hat, or, if that is beyond even his resources, he has an 

 ostrich feather, or a zebra tail, or a fluffy head covering 

 of white marabou down, which he cunningly and with 

 much rakish taste, fixes on his black pate. He feels bound 

 to do honour to himself, the sefari and his bwana. 



I generally made it a point while on the march, to keep 

 near the sefari. I found in many ways the habit paid 

 well. I got to know the men, and they came to know me, 

 and to get good work from any man, he must be sympa- 

 thized with and known. The East African can, I am 

 convinced, be led far, but the man that would lead him 

 must take some trouble to know him. In such a little 



