DOWN THE NILE; THE GIANT ELAND 445 
unnecessary in the way of baggage; the only impedimenta 
which we could not minimize were those connected with 
the preservation of the skins of the big animals, which, of 
course, were throughout our whole trip what necessitated 
the use of the bulk of the porters and other means of 
transportation employed. 
From the neat little station of Redjaf, lying at the foot 
of the bold pyramidal hill of the same name, we marched 
two days west, stopping short of the river Koda, where 
we knew the game drank. Now and then we came on 
flower-bearing bushes, of marvellously sweet scent, like 
gardenias. It was the height of the dry season; the coun¬ 
try was covered with coarse grass and a scrub growth of 
nearly leafless thorn-trees, usually growing rather wide 
apart, occasionally close enough together to look almost 
like a forest. There were a few palms, euphorbias, and 
very rarely scattered clumps of withered bamboo, and also 
bright green trees with rather thick leaves and bean pods, 
on which we afterward found that the eland fed. 
The streams we crossed were dry torrent beds, sandy 
or rocky; in two or three of them were pools of stagnant 
water, while better water could be obtained by digging in 
the sand alongside. A couple of hours after reaching each 
camp everything was in order, and Ali had made a fire of 
some slivers of wood and boiled our tea; and our two 
meals, breakfast and dinner, were taken at a table in the 
open, under a tree. 
We had with us seven black soldiers of the Belgian 
native troops, under a corporal; they came from every 
quarter of the Congo, but several of them could speak 
Swahili, the lingua franca of middle Africa, and so Kermit 
