THROUGH JUNGLE AND DESERT 



CHAP. 



peaceable strain, the elders agreed to sell food, after 

 muma had been made. They then went away. 



At 1 1 A.M. I attended another palaver. This time 

 I found nearly 400 natives assembled, mostly warriors 

 and old men. They were seated in a circle, on the 

 edge of which Lieutenant von Hohnel and I placed 

 our chairs. We were accompanied by Motio, a Masai 

 interpreter, and three Somali. After a preliminary con- 

 ference I learned that this was not to be the muma; 

 but that, ere the blood-brotherhood could be made, 

 a preliminary ceremony had to be performed for the 

 purpose of convincing the Embe of our good inten- 

 tions, and to clean the road over which our feet had 

 passed. They said we had entered their country prior 

 to making a treaty with them, and in consequence each 

 footstep we had taken from the line between their 

 territory and that of the Wamsara might, for all they 

 knew, have some dire effect upon their crops. They 

 said, however, that their suspicions would be allayed, 

 should a male sheep be slaughtered, and portions of 

 its body strewn over the path by which we had come. 

 This was soon done, and the old men -went gayly away, 

 promising to return in the afternoon of that day, and 

 perform the impressive and imposing ceremony of blood- 

 brotherhood. 



It is politic to conform, as far as possible, to the 

 native customs, at least until the natives are fully 

 convinced of one's good intentions. They place no 

 value whatever upon promises ; but all I have met in 

 East Africa seem to attach great importance to any 

 agieement, which they bind either by the killing of 

 a goat or sheep, or by drinking milk, exchanging 



