72 
SOMALILAND 
My headman came up with another grievance. He said 
that one of the camels had fallen down and broken four 
hams (native water-vessels), so that they now leaked badly, 
and that I should have to buy more when I reached Sucut, 
a village to our west. I knew I should have to* examine all 
those hams myself before I could believe a word of it. 
The forests here swarmed with a very pretty parrot 
marked with green and orange, and another bird gorgeously 
clothed in blue, with a brilliant yellow breast. I caught some 
purple butterflies as they fed upon the putrid meat upon 
my antelope skulls, and thought of the Purple Emperor 
at home, w^hich can be caught in the same manner. A long 
dreary march brought us to a lonely spot called Sheelo, 
where we encamped for the night, and where we discovered 
one of the men was missing. I sent off half a dozen men 
to look for him, and fired signal shots at intervals. 
In about an hour shouts for water were heard, and shortly 
after sending it out the lost one was brought in saying he 
was ‘ seek ’ . (sick). When anything ails a Somali, he sits 
down, determined to die, and has to be watched, kicked up, 
and set going again. He utterly refused to say where he 
felt it most. His temperature was very high, and at length 
he owned up that he felt ‘ now hart, now cold,’ so I settled 
him with quinine. Next day, after marching for two hours 
and a half through dense bush, we went up a little rising 
ground, from the top of which we could, see the mountains 
of the Boorgha country, about two days’ march to the west 
of us, and a huge sea of trees in every other direction. 
Skirting northwards round this rise in the ground, we 
encamped near the walls of Sucut for the day, to get news 
and try to obtain a guide for the Boorgha country. Here 
I bought a camel with a broken leg for six tohes of merikani 
cloth, for the men to eat, to encourage them to march a bit 
faster. The number of camels which passed our camp at 
night, on the way to their zareba, was amazing, the wealth 
of the Somalis here being very great. Next morning I 
found the thorn zareba festooned with camel-meat, whilst 
