8 THROUGH SOMALILAND AND ABYSSINIA CHAP. 
hunter, and will stand by his master splendidly. I know of 
one Soméli who, to save his English master, hit a lion over the 
head with the butt of his rifle; and quite lately, under similar 
circumstances, another Somali caught hold of a lion by the 
jaws. Occasionally, however, he relapses into a state of original 
sin; he becomes criminally careless with the camels, breaking. 
everything in the process of loading, from leather to cast steel ; 
and he can be disrespectful, mutinous, and sulky. He is 
inordinately vain, and will walk off into the jungle and make 
his way home to the coast, leaving two months’ back pay and 
rations behind him, if he considers his lordly dignity insulted. 
If he sees a chance of gain he is a toady and flatterer. His 
worst fault is avarice. 
The Somali, although by no means a coward, is much more 
afraid of his fellow-man than of wild animals,—a fact which is 
possibly due to the general insecurity of life and property. 
Above all things he dreads crossing the inland frontiers of his 
country, holding his hereditary enemies the Gallas in abhor- 
rence. He has a great deal of romance in his composition, and 
in his natural nomad state, on the long, lazy days, when there 
is no looting to be done, while his women and children are 
away minding his flocks, he takes his praying-mat and water- 
bottle, and sits a hundred yards from his karia under a flat, 
shady gudd tree, lazily droning out melancholy-sounding chants 
on the themes of his dusky loves, looted or otherwise; on the 
often miserable screw which he calls faras, the horse; and on 
the supreme pleasure of eating stolen camels. 
The summer and winter rains are his great periods of 
activity. There is then plenty of grass, and pools of water are 
abundant throughout the country; he bestrides his “favourite 
mare,” and in company with many dear brothers of his clan, 
leaving his flocks and herds in the charge of his women and 
young children, rides quietly off a hundred miles into the heart 
of the jungle to loot the camels of the next Somali tribe, the 
owners of which are perhaps away doing exactly the same thing 
elsewhere. There is tremendous excitement, and the camels are 
driven across miles of uninhabited wilderness, trailing clouds of 
dust behind them; and so back to the home karia, where he 
finds his own herds have perhaps been looted in his absence. 
He at once goes off on a fresh horse, smarting under his wrongs 
and intent on vengeance; and if in the spear and shield 
skirmish that ensues a man has been killed, he and his com- 
