THE LAND OF THE LION 



green. But there were many places, down in the pre- 

 cipitous hollows, where the searching grass fires always 

 seemed to be beaten back, and the long yellow tangle 

 still made an impenetrable hiding place for rhino and 

 buffalo. 



Among these hills I had made my first bow to African 

 game in 1906, and here I now came for my last sefari and 

 sad good-bye. 



I advise any one wanting a short trip near Nairobi 

 to take his sefari here rather than on to the baked, sticky 

 Athe plains, where most go. Here game is much more 

 various. The stalking ground is better. There are far 

 fewer ticks. And last but not least the scenery is far finer. 



In one morning's tramp I saw rhone (preserved), water- 

 buck, fine, very fine impala, kongoni (Cokes), zebra, 

 duiker-buck, oraby (Kenia oraby, a distinct species), 

 stein-buck, reed-buck, Chanler's reed-buck, bush-buck, 

 and warthog. I also saw rhino, buffalo, and gnu. 

 Think of so great a variety within fifty miles of Nairobi in 

 December, 1908, and each and all of them I could, with 

 time, have shot. 



The hilly country I write of rises several hundred feet 

 above the plateau of Punda Melia, and then growing more 

 rocky and broken, tumbles down to the wide Tana valley, 

 whose floor is more than two thousand feet lower than the 

 Nairobi plain. 



It was from Punda Melia I had first gazed enchanted at 

 the grand curve of Kenia with its crown of purest snow. 

 I was glad indeed again to look on it from the southern 

 side, and compare this view with that from the northern. 

 Kenia is a beautiful mountain, looked at from anywhere. 

 But impressive as it is when seen from these hills above the 

 Tana, the view gives but a poor idea of the lofty grandeur 

 of the peaks that face the north. 



Krapf, the heroic German missionary, was the first 



