TWO DIANAS IN SOMALILAND 259 



always out of range. Time was of such value here 

 we could not make a really big attempt to secure a 

 specimen of picked hartebeest. But I managed after 

 a wearying effort, in which I was frustrated time and 

 time again by alert bands of aoul, who constantly gave 

 the alarm, to bag a smallish sig, a female, and they 

 carry much lighter heads than the male. I could not 

 afford to pick and choose. It was my first hartebeest, 

 and I feared the possibility of going home minus a 

 specimen of the genus. However, Cecily, who did a 

 rival shoot on her own, secured a male, whose horns 

 topped seventeen inches, a great improvement on the 

 beggarly twelve of my trophy. We took the tape 

 measurement on the front curves. 



The sunsets were superb, and heralded the most 

 intense cold. It became necessary to trek every hour 

 we could, as every one dreaded a water famine. We 

 seemed in these days not to sleep at all, but march and 

 march interminably. 



One early morning we found the quaintest of lizards 

 lying in the sun. It had an outspread tail that seemed 

 to overbalance the horrid little thing. Clarence 

 prodded it gently with a small stick, and it cried 

 every time he did it, just like a baby. He told us it 

 is called " asherbody," which translated means baby, 

 and I noticed, not for the first time, that the Somali 

 mind has a nice sense in the christening of things. 



We trekked right into a large Somali zareba, the 

 largest camp we had yet seen, and after a visit from the 

 head-man, were let in for a " tomasho," or native 

 dance, a different thing altogether to the dibaltig, and 



