A MASAI EXODUS 



247 



We shall learn later where these weapons are fashioned, for 

 they are none of them of home manufacture. 



Thus equipped, the young moran goes to the warrior kraal 

 of his district, where amongst his comrades and the ditto or 

 unmarried sweethearts he leads for a time a life of free love. 1 

 Although this is the custom of his country, he has to beware of 

 certain consequences which may ensue. 



Now that he has come to man's estate the moran is bold, 

 conceited, easily excited, and fond of thieving. His greatest 

 desire is to dip his spear in blood, if it be only in that of some 

 stray, half-starved porter, whilst his chief duty is to protect his 

 district, and on this account the warrior kraals are situated 

 near the most exposed portions of each division of Masai- 

 land. 



A Masai kraal consists of an outer circle of huts, looking 

 like brown cardboard honeycombs, varying in height from 

 about three and a half to six feet, by nine or twelve feet in 

 diameter. In the open space within this circle are a few 

 smaller shelters for young calves and kids. The population of 

 the kraal varies greatly in number, and some of them contain 

 more than a thousand souls. When a change of pasture is 

 necessary for the cattle, the framework of the huts is often 

 taken up and, with the few milk-bowls, straw mats, calabashes, 

 smoke-dried oxhides, and other household goods, packed on the 

 donkeys and draught oxen or carried by the women. The 

 exodus begins, and when fresh grazing grounds are reached 

 the women have to rebuild the bumba. 



The moran kraal differs from that of the moruu in having 



1 We did not ourselves see anything of the severe treatment of an unmarried 

 girl about to become a mother, in the warrior kraal, alluded to by Thomson. 

 Her lover would have to pay her father the fine of an ox, a goat, a sheep, and eight 

 pots of honey, but it is not likely that a native of Africa would put his daughter to 

 death for a slip from virtue, as she is to him merely a marketable article. What 

 Thomson says, however, with regard to the preventive measures taken, was rally 

 borne out by what we learnt. 



