270 
AFRICAN GAME TRAILS 
that they were all in readiness in a letter to Cuninghame, 
which was meant to be entirely respectful, but which 
sounded odd, as it was couched in characteristic Baboo 
English. The opening lines ran: ‘'Dear K-ham, the 
donkeys are altogether deadly.’’ 
At last fifty Kikuyus assembled—they are not able to 
carry the loads of regular Swahili porters—and I started 
that moment, though it was too late in the afternoon to 
travel more than three or four miles. The Kikuyus were 
real savages, naked save for a dingy blanket, usually carried 
round the neck. They formed a picturesque safari; but it 
was difficult to make the grasshopper-like creatures take 
even as much thought for the future as the ordinary happy- 
go-lucky porters take. At night if it rained they cow¬ 
ered under the bushes in drenched and shivering discom¬ 
fort; and yet they had to be driven to make bough shelters 
for themselves. Once these shelters were up, and a little 
fire kindled at the entrance of each, the moping, spiritless 
wretches would speedily become transformed into beings 
who had lost all remembrance of ever having been wet or 
cold. After their posho had been distributed and eaten 
they would sit, huddled and cheerful, in their shelters, and 
sing steadily for a couple of hours. Their songs were 
much wilder than those of the regular porters, and were 
often warlike. Occasionally, some “shanty man,” as he 
would be called on shipboard, improvised or repeated a 
kind of story in short sentences or strophes; but the main 
feature of each song was the endless repetition of some re¬ 
frain, musically chanted in chorus by the whole party. 
This repetition of a short sentence or refrain is a charac¬ 
teristic of many kinds of savage music; I have seen the 
