iv THE BUILDING OF THE TSAVO BRIDGE 45 



be found, for the whole district abounds in rock, 

 but that it was so intensely hard as to be almost 

 impossible to work, and a bridge built of it would 

 have been very costly. I spent many a weary day 

 trudging through the thorny wilderness vainly 

 searching for suitable material, and was beginning 

 to think that we should be forced to use iron columns 

 for the piers, when one day I stumbled quite by 

 accident on the very thing. Brock and I were out 

 " pot- hunting," and hearing some guinea-fowl 

 cackling among the bushes, I made a circuit half 

 round them so that Brock, on getting in his shot, 

 should drive them over in my direction. I eventually 

 got into position on the edge of a deep ravine and 

 knelt on one knee, crouching down among the ferns. 

 There I had scarcely time to load when over flew a 

 bird, which I missed badly ; and I did not have 

 another chance, for Brock had got to work, and 

 being a first-rate shot had quickly bagged a brace. 

 Meanwhile I felt the ground very hard under my 

 knee, and on examination found that the bank of 

 the ravine was formed of stone, which extended for 

 some distance, and which was exactly the kind of 

 material for which I had long been fruitlessly 

 searching. I was greatly delighted with my un- 

 expected discovery, though at first I had grave 

 misgivings about the distance to be traversed and 

 the difficulty of transporting the stone across the 



