THE MOUNT ELGON COUNTRY 
285 
the mountain. It was evident that only a few ever 
had been up the mountain upon the slopes of which 
they had spent their lives. 
We began to think that they wanted us to stay 
in their village just so they could have the pleasure 
of their daily shauris. 
Finally one sultan promised to get us guides and 
accepted a generous present on the strength of it; 
but when the time came he failed to produce them. 
It was at precisely this point, to be strictly accu¬ 
rate, that we abandoned the polite phraseology of 
the court and told him with many exclamation 
points that he would have to guide us himself or 
we would take steps to dethrone him. Of course, all 
of this had to be strained through two interpreters, 
but even then I think he caught the gist of it. He 
said that he himself would guide us to the nearest 
and largest cave. 
We told him that we would be ready to start im¬ 
mediately after luncheon. Only ourselves and a few 
men to carry cameras and guns were to constitute 
our party, the rest of the safari remaining in camp, 
from which certain embassies were sent out to buy 
grain for the porters’ food. 
Soon after lunch the sultan arrived and we 
marched away. Little by little groups of his janis¬ 
saries, mamelukes, and other members of his of¬ 
ficial entourage joined us and by the time we 
reached the slope leading up to the great cave¬ 
dwelling we had quite an imposing procession. 
Most of the natives were armed with spears and 
