240 
THE STRAND MAGAZINE . 
A track has an individuality of its own. 
which distinguishes it from all other marks 
whatsoever ; no two men or animals leave 
the same record in the sand, and no man or 
animal can leave any record but that which 
is personal and peculiar to himself. For the 
Bedouin, or other desert man, each com- 
bination is a thing as truly individual and 
as little to be confounded with anything else 
as a face or picture, and when he has examined 
and fixed it in his memory he is able to recog- 
nize it again under all its changes of appear- 
ance. lie will identify the tracks of a full- 
grown camel as those of an animal of whose 
prints lie had taken notice when it was two 
years old, and this with as little difficulty 
as an ordinary person experiences in recog- 
nizing a man he has known as a boy. 
For example : A Maaza guide in the employ 
of the Frontier Police asked for a fortnight’s 
leave. He said that his sister had requested 
him to look for a four-year-old camel which 
was grazing in the Arabian Desert, and had 
not been heard of 
for over five months. 
He had known the 
tracks of this camel 
when it was a two- 
year - old, but had 
not seen it since. He 
got the leave and 
found the camel 
One of their best 
trackers, one Hussein 
lares, was remark- 
able for his powers 
of d i s t i n g u i s h ing 
camel tracks. He 
could even imitate 
them with his hands. 
The other trackers 
used to amuse them- 
selves by covering 
up with sand half 
the footprint of a 
c a m e 1 , obliterating 
all the other foot- 
prints, but he was 
generally able to 
name the camel to 
Which the track 
belonged. 
A final illustration is that of a smart piece of 
tracking by a Maaza woman, told by Mr. S. 
Royle. “ There were five flocks of sheep and 
goats, averaging perhaps ninety to a hundred 
and fifty head each, watering at a well where 
we were at the same time. They started off 
in different directions, and shortly afterwards 
this woman turned up. On asking what she 
wanted, she said that three of her goats had 
gone off with some other flocks, and she cut 
the tracks of all of them and found to whic'i 
flock her goats had attached themselves and 
went and got them, although the flocks by 
that time were out of sight. She passed us on 
her return quite unaware that she had done 
any t hi ng re m arkabl e.” 
Seeing how valuable the services of these 
men are to the Frontier Police, it is unfortu- 
nate that the legal mind, as found in the 
“ Parquet,” or Court for Criminal Cases, 
refuses to believe in the value of their evidence, 
and the consequence is that numbers of crimi- 
nals who are traced by these men are let off 
for want of legal 
proof. The lawyer 
cannot understand 
that a lifelong train- 
ing renders these 
men perspicacious to 
an incredible degree 
in this particular 
line, and they can- 
11 o t , moreover, 
understand the frame 
of mind of the 
Bedouin as he reads 
tracks. To him the 
evidence of the 
tracks is quite clear, 
and it is as difficult 
for him to believe 
that the untrained 
eye cannot check the 
details of his evi- 
dence, when the foot- 
print itself stares 
you in the face, as 
it is for the mere 
lawyer to appreciate 
the significance of 
what is so plain to 
the desert man. 
THE CHIEF TRACKER — IX THE BACKGROUND ARE 
MEMBERS OF THE FRONTIER POLICE (SOUDANESE). 
From a Photograph, 
