viii EXCURSIONS FROM EL BOGOI 183 



ready, and I could bathe and rest, for it had been intensely- 

 hot work in the dense brake, under a broiling sun, and I was 

 tired. In the evening I arranged for two of my Ndorobo 

 companions to go back with all speed the next day, to call 

 their friends and send word to Lesiat and his clan to come and 

 eat the elephants, that the meat might not be wasted. 



This was the most interesting country I had yet been in. 

 It was perfectly wild — not even any signs of Ndorobo natives 

 about — and quite new, that is, no white man had ever been 

 into the district. In these respects it satisfied my craving 

 for absolutely untouched nature. Ahead, the berg — a part 

 of the Mathews range — loomed up imposingly. It seemed 

 really a big mountain, much higher than I had thought, often 

 cloud-capped, and apparently with " subugo " forest on the 

 top. This mysterious El Gereh swamp, too, which absorbs 

 all these streams, had always had an attractive interest for me. 

 The contrast between the green, damp valley and the dry, 

 barren hills enclosing it is very marked and curious. What 

 crops of bananas and sugar-cane these moist alluvial flats 

 might produce, I could not help thinking, if there were only 

 cultivators ! But the climate is trying — excessively hot and 

 very malarious — and I myself was by no means in the robust 

 health I had enjoyed during the whole of my previous trip. 

 I only wished that I felt better up to the work I made no 

 doubt was before me ; but my appetite was indifferent, and 

 I did not sleep comfortably, and so, of course, my strength 

 suffered. 



I did not get off quite so early as usual the morning after 

 (31st August), not intending to go far, but merely to prospect 

 the country ahead a bit. I took one Ndorobo boy with me, 

 while the other was to remain to show my men yesterday's 

 elephants, for them to take the fat out of (to be used for 

 purposes of light, etc.), the remaining two lads having already 

 started to carry the news of the harvest of meat to their friends. 

 \Vc followed the spoor of the retreating herd of yesterday, up 



