xviii EL BOGOI TO MOMBASA 427 



have to say that any idea of attaching a spiritual signification 

 to his words was at once dispelled by Lesiat's avowal that he 

 spoke solely of his carnal heart. He simply meant to say that 

 he wished to be brought to life again if he should die. He 

 said, too, that their sons were too useful in searching for wild 

 honey, to be spared. 



Notwithstanding the upsetting of the theory that this pretty 

 little speech was a romantic appeal for religious instruction, 

 Lesiat declared, in reply to my queries, that they would welcome 

 a European to live among them, and that the women and 

 children would come to be taught. There certainly seems an 

 opening for useful work among such raw material. If only 

 they could be induced to cultivate the rich soil at the foot of 

 their mountains, where rain is frequent, the Ndorobos of Lorogi 

 might always have abundance. But I fear me, when taught 

 settled ways of living, they would lose their picturesqueness, 

 and miss the romantic wild life as the forest Indians of Brazil 

 and their little peccaries — reclaimed by the old Jesuit father — 

 missed the shade of the primeval woods. 



I am not one to give an optimistic picture of this or any 

 other district in Equatorial Africa. There are suitable spots 

 here and there at the foot of the Lorogis for stations, where 

 brooks issue from the mountain — soon to sink into the earth, 

 like all streams in this country, but sufficient to irrigate a little 

 of the adjacent rich soil, — and the climate is not a bad one. 

 At the western foot the country is more attractive, though the 

 soil is less fertile ; and water is there more abundant, while the 

 mountain forest (not like an African forest at all) is at hand 

 with useful timber. But all such favoured spots are exceptional 

 in Equatorial Africa — as I know it, — like islands in the desert; 

 there is no extent of useful country. The streams will not 

 flow any distance ; their waters evaporate or become absorbed 

 by the soil. From the Jambeni range and Kenia northward, 

 as far as Bassu and beyond, none of the drainage water ever 

 reaches the ocean — at all events, above ground, — and such 



