A HUNTER'S CAMP-FIRES 



the gun-bearer several times graphically illustrating to an ap- 

 preciative audience of our camp-followers the white man's 

 method of crawling away from an inquisitive rhino. 



Before starting on the hunt that day we had left instructions 

 with Nubi, our headman, to finish trading with the natives, and 

 to move camp to a stream five miles west of the villages. Tow- 

 ard evening, while we were silently tramping in single file 

 through the forest which bordered this stream, we were startled 

 by the dropping of several large dead branches to the ground at 

 our feet. On looking upward for the cause we were surprised 

 to see a large troop of baboons gazing down at us through the 

 branches of the trees. Previously we had noticed many troops 

 of these animals in the vicinity of rocky kopjes, but this was 

 the first time that we had seen any in the trees overhead. The 

 grizzled old dog-baboons certainly seemed enormous in size 

 and ferocious in appearance when viewed from below as they 

 climbed among the swaying branches. 



We found our tents pitched in a small clearing among the 

 trees, and here parted with the friendly chief and his followers. 

 However, Mtu Muniki left with us as guides two of his young 

 warriors who understood the language of the next tribe to the 

 westward, known as the Samburu. During the whole of the 

 next morning these natives led our caravan in a northwesterly 

 direction through a monotonous rolling country covered with 

 dry, yellow grass several feet in height. There was no game in 

 sight and a merciless sun overhead. About noon, with the aid 

 of the glasses, two giraffes were discovered among acacias in 

 the distance, and Fuguet left the column in order to stalk them. 

 After resting the porters for several hours in the shade of some 

 palms until the donkey- train overtook us, I again started the 

 caravan northward. 



Toward sundown, as we were crossmg a flat, grass-covered 

 plain, a herd of about sixty Grant's gazelles appeared in the 

 distance, travelling in a course which would intercept the trail 



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