VIII 
JOURNEY TO WEB BE SHABELEH RIVER 
207 
of a pool of rain-water, hobbled the animals, lit a lire, and threw 
ourselves down in a circle round it to sleep, one man keeping 
watch over the animals. At 3 a.m. we were again on the move, 
and began to descend a long slope cut up by deep ravines, which 
falls to the Webbe Shabeleh river. We lost ourselves among 
impassable, precipitous watercourses several times ; the guides, 
however, always managed, after much difficulty, to regain the 
path, which had been grown over with grass, and, because of 
the Amaden raids, had been unused for a year. We reached 
the Webbe Shabeleh at Ime at 1.30 p.m., having done the 
seventy-five miles in thirty-two hours at a moderate pace without 
a change of animals. 
As we neared Ime the view became very fine. The Shabeleh 
or Haines river lay before us, flowing in a tortuous course from 
north-east to south-west, its banks marked by a line of tall 
trees, with dense undergrowth of many varieties of evergreen 
bush of great size and beauty. The lines of high trees, following 
the winding river-banks, and covering the long narrow islands, 
reminded me of the banks of the Seine at Rouen, the trees 
growing in the shape of a poplar. The tall tops of these trees 
are constantly waving when there is any breeze, the gray-green 
foliage reflecting the light and giving a peculiarly lively character 
to the landscape. On the southern side were two low rocky 
hills, rising from the alluvial plain, wooded round their base ; 
and in these woods, which were crowned by tall graceful “ toddy” 
palms like those of India, lay the large cluster of beehive villages 
of the Adone, collectively called Ime. 
Most of the open flats near the river-banks are cultivated by 
these negroes, or are left as pasture-land, to be grazed over by 
the Adone cattle and the herds of water-buck and Soemmer- 
ring’s gazelles. Behind the broad river valley, some fifteen 
miles to the south, rose a wall of lofty blue mountains, piled in 
picturesque confusion of peak and plateau to a height which I 
judged to be not less than eight or nine thousand feet above 
sea-level. The long slope of broken ground rising from the 
river to the base of the mountains was covered over its entire 
surface with monotonous thorn-jungle. The Arussi Gallas, who 
are camel-owning nomads like the Somalis, occupy these mount- 
ainous districts. These highlands are mysterious and attractive 
to the traveller, for the reason that no European penetrated them 
until the entry of the two well-armed expeditions of Captain 
Bottiga and Prince Ruspoli, which, so far as I could ascertain 
