WE DECIDE TO RETRACE OUR STEPS 199 



much further. We never for a moment entertained the idea of 

 being compelled to return by the eastern shore of Lake Eudolf ; 

 for we had not forgotten all we had gone through on our way 

 here. The thought of retracing our steps was utterly abhorrent 

 to us and to our men ; and they were so eager to prevent any- 

 thing of the sort that the more enterprising of them volunteered 

 to go and explore northward for themselves. They could easily 

 do so under pretence of wanting to fish in the rivers, especially 

 as angling was not possible in the lake itself. Some of the 

 men had already gone fishing in the rivers on the north without 

 our knowledge ; and the Eeshiat were quite accustomed to 

 seeing small parties wandering about the country. 



The immediate result of our apparent amenity to advice 

 was that great quantities of dhurra were brought into market, 

 not so much from the Eeshiat themselves as from their 

 neighbours the Buma and Donyiro. Five sheep were also 

 offered for sale one day, but they were not for us, as all our 

 Ukuta beads were gone, and the beautiful Muscat stuffs we 

 offered were declined. 



The supplies of dhurra, too, came to an end long before we 

 had got nearly as much as we wanted. The reason of this was 

 the persistent rising of the floods, cutting off intercourse even 

 amongst the natives, except in a very restricted area. Further 

 difficulties arose from the continuous downpour of rain lasting 

 from May 4 to 9, and making it quite impossible to think of 

 travelling. We could easily picture to ourselves now the state 

 of things in the lowlands north of Lake Eudolf, where the land 

 was flooded by the rising of the lake as well as by the rain. 

 The accounts brought by our people varied ver}^ much, some 

 saying it was still possible to get round by the north, others 

 that it simply could not be done. Day by day the terrible fact 

 became more clear that we should have, after all, to return by 

 the east coast, and we gradually turned our attention to the 



