68 TWO DIANAS IN SOMALILAND 
up the beds, placed our goods and chattels to hand, 
and prepared a bath each for us if we happened to be 
in a place where a bath was not too great a luxury, and 
a mere sponge if water was absent. 
Meanwhile the cook had a fire going, or theoretically 
he had, though very often it was a long time before it 
got started. The camel men hacked down thorn bushes, 
using native axes, and hangols , or wooden crooks, for 
pulling the wood about with. The chant that accom- 
panies all Somali occupations was loud and helpful. 
Sometimes we took a hand at this zareba building, 
using an English axe or a bill-hook, and the men would 
laugh in surprise, and hold the boughs in readiness for 
us to chop. They liked the English axes. “ Best axe 
I see,” the camel-man in chief said. But we would 
not lend them permanently, because they would have 
been broken at once. Every mortal thing goes to 
pieces in the hands of these Somalis ; most extraordi- 
nary. Only tough native implements could stand 
against such treatment. Buck were carried slung on 
Sniders, and bent the weapon into graceful curves. 
The sights and even the triggers were knocked off. 
The Somali boys broke all the handles off the pans, 
and seemed incapable of taking care of anything. 
Many of the native hams gave out at the different 
wells because of the smashing about they received, 
and meant our buying more from passing tribes. 
At night my shikar pistol, loaded, lay to my hand 
on a box at my bedside, for what I don’t quite know, 
as I should have disliked immensely to use it. But 
it seemed the correct thing ; the butler expected it. 
