6 
AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 
hundreds of elephant and buffalo; and these four animals 
are the most dangerous of the world’s big game, when 
hunted as they are hunted in Africa. To hear him tell of 
what he has seen and done is no less interesting to a nat¬ 
uralist than to a hunter. There were on the ship many 
men who loved wild nature, and who were keen hunters of 
big game; and almost every day, as we steamed over the 
hot, smooth waters of the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, 
we would gather on deck around Selous to listen to tales of 
those strange adventures that only come to the man who 
has lived long the lonely life of the wilderness. 
On April 21 we steamed into the beautiful and pictur¬ 
esque harbor of Mombasa. Many centuries before the 
Christian era, dhows from Arabia, carrying seafarers of 
Semitic races whose very names have perished, rounded the 
Lion’s Head at Guardafui and crept slowly southward 
along the barren African coast. Such dhows exist to-day 
almost unchanged, and bold indeed were the men who first 
steered them across the unknown oceans. They were men 
of iron heart and supple conscience, who fronted inconceiv¬ 
able danger and hardship; they established trading stations 
for gold and ivory and slaves; they turned these trading 
stations into little cities and sultanates, half Arab, half negro. 
Mombasa was among them. In her time of brief splendor 
Portugal seized the city; the Arabs won it back; and now 
England holds it. It lies just south of the equator, and 
when we saw it the brilliant green of the tropic foliage 
showed the town at its best. 
We were welcomed to Government House in most cordial 
fashion by the acting Governor, Lieutenant-Governor Jack- 
son, who is not only a trained public official of long experience 
