366 



OUR STAY AT NDORO 



hour. Grey, and trembling with the cold, but at the same 

 time greatly delighted, the venerable medicine-man led forward 

 a fat black cow and asked for Count Teleki. This was just 

 what our people wanted, and Jumbe Kimemeta, Kijanja, Juma 

 Mussa, and everyone else who could speak Kikuyu, cried with 

 one voice, 'What ! you ask for the Count when you are wet to 

 the knees ; where should the white Leibon be but with Ngai on 

 Kilimara ? Who but he gave the rain ? ' and so they went on, 

 the old Leibon listening delighted, and promising as much food 

 as we could eat. 



We bought 3,500 rations that day, and although the natives 

 had been weeks coUecting all these stores, they sold them at 

 the very cheap rate of three or four rations for a string of 

 beads. The next day, though it rained in torrents, fresh piles 

 of fruit were brought in, and it was all we could do to stitch 

 the sacks up quickly enough in which were packed the maize, 

 beans, &c. The green bananas, yams, and potatoes were served 

 out as rations then and there. 



The rain still continued to pour down day after day, only 

 stopping from about one to three o'clock, and noting this, it 

 was presently my turn to try my hand at controlling the 

 weather. On the 21st some 150 Kikuyu women came into 

 camp, and it seemed as if the flood-gates of heaven were 

 opened, for our camp was half under water. This was too^ 

 much of a good thing, and now the old Leibon came to beg me 

 to make it fine whilst the market was being held. As it was 

 then nearly one o'clock, I at once ventured to promise it would 

 soon stop raining, adding that I must just have time to com- 

 municate with the head Leibon on Kilimara. Sure enough the 

 powers were propitious ; it cleared up at one, and the market 

 was held without rain. 



As our visitors came from a long distance, they got through 

 their business quickly and went home again, but the old Leibon 



