120 
TWO DIANAS IN SOMALILAND 
impetus to our men, who grew quite lively, game for 
anything, as they chanted invitations to imaginary 
animals to come and be shot. All the song was of the 
“ Dilly, Dilly, come and get killed ” pattern, and was 
for the most part addressed to a rhinoceros who lived 
in fancy. “ Wiyil, Wiyil, Mem-sahib calls you,” was 
the bed-rock of the anthem, and like our home-made 
variety one sentence had to go a long way. 
We found a track made by tortoises innumerable who 
evidently marched in solid phalanx to the water-holes. 
We followed the trail for a long way, but it seemed to 
be taking us to a Never-never land, so we turned, giving 
up the idea of discovering the source of the path. But 
in a tiny lake, as big as a bath and as shallow, we came 
on three tortoises swimming. They drew in their ugly 
snake-like heads with a sideway motion beneath their 
armour-plate residence, and there was nothing left 
to see but a flat, dirty, yellow carapace. They were 
quite small, and we pulled one out with a deft noose 
thrown by the second hunter. Each man took off 
his turned-up sandals and rested one bare foot at a 
time on the shelly back, “ to make strong the feet.” 
They did this very solemnly, and, of course, in turns, 
mounting their ponies when the superstitious rite was 
well over. 
We saw a very immature gereniik standing on his 
hind legs to feed on the young tops of a thorn bush. 
It went off at a crouching trot, stopping after a short 
run to turn and stare. It even returned a few paces, 
with unparalleled impudence, to gaze. It was a young- 
ster of last season. The gereniik mother is not the 
