CHAPTER III 



ACROSS THE MAU ESCARPMENT TO LION 



LAND 



A LDAMA RAVINE BOMA* stands on a high, flat 

 /JL topped hill commanding an immensely extensive 

 and very beautiful view. To the east rises the fine Aberdare 

 range, not yet accurately surveyed, but probably some of 

 its summits are 14,000 feet high. To the north, surrounded 

 by a very tumult of gorges and precipices, lies Lake Baringo. 

 On the west and northwest the wall of the forest clad Mau 

 lifts its fine purple masses. 



Evening is the best time to climb to the neat native 

 village on the very summit of the hill. Here the askaris's 

 families live. The red earth is swept twice a day, no trace 

 of rubbish anywhere, and the red thatched circular cottages 

 stand in orderly rows. As the sun sinks behind the great 

 woodland, a flood of such evening light as is only to be seen 

 in Africa, pours all over the varied country you are looking 

 down on from a height of almost eight thousand feet. At 

 your feet are some of the richest shambas in the whole 

 Protectorate. In them two heavy crops are raised yearly, 

 and I measured a peach tree in the government shamba 

 fifteen inches in diameter, only seven years old. 



For forty miles the land slopes eastward and northward, 

 The country toward Baringo is very dry and sandy. The 

 mountains on either side seem to catch and hold the rain 

 clouds, for the rainfall at the boma and on the Aberdare 

 is excessive; in the valley it is light and precarious, and 



* Boma means many things, a fenced enclosure to guard against lions, hence any fenced place. 

 Government posts in earlier and unsettled days were always rudely fortified. 



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