CHAPTER XIII 



BRITISH EAST AFRICA (CONTINUED) : 

 ON SAFARI TO SOTIK 



Down the western edge of the Kikuyu escarp- 

 ment the train came snorting and pufBng, as 

 though terrified of some unseen foe that hunted it 

 along the metal road of the Uganda Railway. 

 Below us the last golden lights of the sun lingered 

 on that immense ditch on the face of Africa, 

 which extends from Lake Nyasa to the Dead 

 Sea, and is known as the Great Rift Valley. 

 Out of evening haze and gathering gloom there 

 loomed up the crater masses of Longonot and 

 Suswa, and in the fast-darkening foreground 

 Mount Margaret took rugged shape. The loco- 

 motive twisted around a bend in the highway 

 that leads to Victoria Nyanza, and above us 

 tall cedar trees and the dense bush which gives 

 cover to the shy bongo antelope, seemed as the 

 outlines of a phantom garden tended by giants 

 of the air. Down, down, down the train dashed, 

 over Yankee-built viaducts, twisting, curving, 

 ever descending till it halted exhausted at 

 Kijabe at the foot of the cliff. 



The last tinges of red and gold and ochre had 

 died in the western sky, and it was with lanterns 

 and much peering that we bundled our porters, 

 Somali servants, ponies and impedimenta out of 

 the train. Kijabe means " the wind," and the 

 place is well named. Behind the little station 



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