290 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Voi. XI1I/. 
hours without seeing the vestige of any Hartebeest, when I eame across & 
confiding herd of Aoul(Soemmering’s gazelle), and being short of food in camp 
shot a buck for the common larder, As I was walking up to him I saw in the 
dancing haze of the distance the figure of a Somali running towards me, 
evidently having heard the shot. A few minutes later, while the necessary 
“ Bismillah” was being muttered over the dead buck, he came panting up, 
and in spite of his unkempt locks and altered, jungly attire, the unique and 
aggressive squint with which his eyes greeted me told me instantly that he 
eould be none other than my old camel-syce, Adan, who had been in my 
service up to the time I left the country four years before. He was equally 
quick to recognize me, and while he assisted to skin the gazelle we had a talk 
over old times, He told me that when I had left the Somali Coast he had 
gone back to his tribe in the interior and had never visited the Ports since, 
but had been: doing a little trade on his own account, and thet when he heard 
my shot he was hurrying across the “ ban’’ to catch up his caravan which 
was then en route to Harrar with trade-goods, When he gave me the direc- 
tion I could just make out aseries of tiny black specks on the trembling 
horizon, representing his string of camels. It would have been death to 
him to lose his party on this thirsty prairie, so as soon as the buck was cut 
up I presented him with my blessing and as much meat as he could carry, 
and we went our several ways, each thinking, I expect, of the unlooked for 
coincidence of our meeting. 
But yet another surprise was in store for me that morning. I must 
have been walking for quite three hours after parting with Adan, and 
was beginning to feel inclined for some lunch, (in this case a stick of 
chocolate,) when I descried with my glasses, far away on the 
open ban, a small black object which puzzled usa good deal. We knew 
there were no village encampments for many miles around, and it could 
not be a halting caravan, because the spot was nowhere near any of the 
camel-tracks crossing the Haud, and yet, after another good look, we came 
to the conclusion that it could be nothing else than a Somali hut ; but what 
was it doing in such a place at this inhospitable season? Another half- 
hour’s walk would decide, so we trudged on towards it. — 
As we got nearer it became evident that it wasa rough shelter of sorts, 
and must be inhabited, for after going a little further we put upa Spotted 
Hyena out of the grass, and he was not likely to be in such close proximity 
for nothing. Sure enough when we got up to within 20 or 30 yards we 
made out two Somalis asleep beneath a rough awing consisting of 
two or three camel-mats stretched over four upright sticks, and as, 
awoken by our approaching footsteps, they got up and peered around, what 
was my surprise to be greeted with ‘‘ Good morning, Sir,” in excellent 
English, and to recognize in the speakers two Midgan shikaris who had 
been formerly well known tome One of them had been severely mauled 
