VII 



ON THE SHORES OF THE NDJIRI LAKES 



THE rainy season had come to an end as sudden- 

 ly as it had begun. Within three weeks immense 

 masses of water had flooded the parched steppe, filling 

 the pools, large and small, to overflowing. The dry, 

 yellow-brown ground, as if 1)y magic, had been covered 

 A\'ith green; trees and bushes were filled with new life; 

 rivers and rix'ulets had been changed into rushing 

 streams. 



The vast depression near the western foot of the Kili- 

 manjaro range, the deepest parts of which are known 

 as the western anrl eastern Ndjiri swamps, is like a big 

 basin, into which flow masses of water; all the lower 

 parts of the wide steppe are periodically transformed 

 into lakes. The animals had, during these weeks, 

 spread over the whole country, for everywhere food 

 and water could be found. 



This feast of plenty soon reached its zenith ; the earth 

 swallowed most of the jirecious liquid, and vegetation 

 began to decline. Slowly the roving animals gath- 

 ered again around the perennial reservoirs of water 



55 



