WILD LIFE ACROSS THE WORLD 



way round its edge, which makes navigation difficult, 

 and provides food for the hippos. 



The water is good and drinkable, but after a few 

 days it usually produces terrible indigestion, perhaps 

 from the presence of some alkaline matter in it. How- 

 ever, if this is so, it is a flavourless chemical. The 

 banks have a dense fringe of the tall, graceful papyrus 

 grass. 



To return to my narrative. At 5.0 p.m. we arrived 

 at Naivasha, and as it was too late to go on, we pitched 

 our camp alongside the station. It turned out a nasty 

 night — cold, with a drizzling rain and gusty wind, 

 which threatened to blow our tent over several times, 

 making it hard to beHeve that we were in the tropics, 

 almost on the Equator itself. 



The next morning broke fine and bright, and then 

 the lake indeed looked beautiful, with its green fringe 

 and the water sparkling under the brilliant tropical 

 sun. 



We had an early breakfast, afterwards moving off 

 until we found a really comfortable spot to camp, for 

 I intended staying a few days in each place, in order 

 to get opportunities of studying the bird life. The 

 camp here had a precipice of some hundred feet high 

 close behind it, in front a stretch of green grass about a 

 hundred yards wide, then a belt of thorny acacia trees, 

 more grass, and in front of that again the belt of 

 papyrus grass bordering the lake. 



68 



