366 RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION 



— in a land where few have preceded one — such a 

 consideration is capable of operating to give rise 

 to the execution of prodigies. The number of 

 such regions, however, even in the immensity of 

 Africa, grows yearly smaller and smaller, so that 

 when they come to be temptingly held out to us it 

 grows difficult indeed to disregard them. 



For years past the plains of British East Africa 

 have been the scenes of most of the game ex- 

 peditions of note. So much is this the case that 

 even among those who have never participated 

 in them there is something of familiarity in the 

 names of the different centres, as in the scenery 

 depicted in the numberless photographs which 

 have laid bare the character of the country for 

 the information and entertainment of those at 

 home. Who among us, to whom African shooting 

 is a matter of interest, has not heard of the Athi 

 Plain, the Rift Valley, Taveita, Elgon, Naivasha, 

 and all the rest of them ? Who does not conjure up 

 before his mental vision, when such names as these 

 are pronounced, a wide plain, sometimes covered 

 with stunted thorn trees, sometimes offering an 

 unexampled view over the short, well-grazed 

 verdure, of zebras, gazelles, and hartebeestes ? 

 One seems to have seen it all without having been 

 there — ^to have had some of the sport without 

 drawing any of the indispensable cheques. But 

 farther south it is different; you get your shooting, 

 as much as any man is reasonably entitled to, but 

 instead of the over-commercial " you draw the 

 cheque and we do the rest " methods of British 

 East African expedition caterers, you have a new 



