10 ON SAFARI 



including those few that fall within my own narrow 

 limits, to wit — Nakuru, Elmenteita, Naivasha and 

 Baringo. 



Eburu was the spot whereat we had decided to 

 commence om' operations. It is merely the name of 

 a rugged, volcanic range lying at the verge of the Rift 

 at a point where the hills open out upon rolling 

 prairie and the basin of the Enderit River. 



Eburu proved an awkward place to encamp, there 

 being absolutely neither wood nor water ; for both of 

 which prime necessaries we were dependent on the 

 good-will of the baboo station-master. Since then the 

 station has been abandoned, and Eburu has reverted to 

 primaeval desolation. 



That first morning in camp, as the grey light 

 strengthened to the dawn, we perceived, high overhead 

 on the mountain-side, what apj)eared to be columns of 

 smoke. These, for one unhappy moment, suggested 

 that other camp-fires desecrated our vale. We were 

 reassured on learning that these were geysers — ^jets of 

 steam issuing from fissures in the plutonic rock. No 

 other inhabitants, indeed — save baboons, which barked 

 and chattered from the rocks above, and others of 

 savage nature — abused our solitude. The name Eburu, 

 we were told, in the Masai tongue signifies " steam." 



Our object in making Eburu our starting-point was 

 to obtain here specimens of Chanler's reedbuck, an 

 elusive little antelope that, belying its name and 

 abandoning the marshy habitat of its congeners (save 

 one), elects to live, chamois-like, on rocks and rugged 

 mountain-faces. That one exception is the so-called 

 Rhooi rhehok {Cervicapra ftdvoi'ufitla) of South 

 Africa, which, although a true reedbuck, is also, like 

 the present, of mountain- loving habit. 



Chanler's reedbuck is only a small species, weighing 

 some 70 lbs., and was C[uite abundant on the rocks of 

 Eburu ; we found it, nevertheless, a most troublesome 

 trophy to secure. Its head and neck are tawny yellow, 

 yet so precisely does the body-colour assimilate with 



