352 
IN AFRICA 
tives treated his daily religious devotions. He was 
the only one in camp who prayed—at least openly 
—and as he knelt and bowed and went through the 
customary form of a Mohammedan prayer there 
was never the slightest disposition to make fun of 
him. In a camp of one hundred white men I feel 
sure that one of them who prayed aloud three times 
a day would hardly have escaped a good deal of ir¬ 
reverent ridicule from those about him. The natives 
in our camp never dreamed of questioning Hassan’s 
right to worship in any way he pleased and the life 
and activities of the camp flowed along smoothly as 
if unconscious of the white-robed figure whose voice 
sang out his praises of Allah. The whole camp 
seemed to have a deep respect for Hassan. 
Abdi, our head-man, was also a Somali, but of a 
different tribe. He was from Jubaland and had 
lived many years with white men. In all save color 
he was more white than black. He was handsome, 
good-tempered, efficient, and so kind to his men that 
sometimes the discipline of the camp suffered be¬ 
cause of it. It was Abdi’s duty to direct the por¬ 
ters in their work of moving camp, distributing 
loads, pitching camp, getting wood for the big 
camp-fires, punishing delinquents and, in fact, to 
see that the work of the safari was done. 
One night after we had been most successful in 
a big lion hunt during the day Abdi came to the 
mess tent, where we were lingering over a particu¬ 
larly good dinner. Abdi asked for his orders for the 
following day and then, seeing that we were in a 
