PROTECTION OF BIG GAME 
299 
there) that some may even wish to settle on waterless 
Reserves with an idea of getting superior shooting 
what time that “ moderate capital ” lasts ! 
The chief Game-Reserve attacked in these ad 
cajptandum lucubrations (indeed, the only one, since 
the others are as yet merely nominal tracts far beyond 
any present question of white occupation) is the great 
Athi Plains Reserve. Now the contention that white 
men are prohibited, in the interests of game, from 
settling upon these Athi Plains is childish nonsense, 
designed in most instances to deceive the ignorant, or 
—worse still—to create prejudice. For the Athi 
Plains are uninhabitable by man, whether white or 
black, by reason of the absence of water. They extend 
over upwards of 100 miles in length east and west, and 
throughout that vast stretch there is no permanent 
water between Makindu at mile 209 and the Athi River 
at mile 311. 
AVhat is the sturdy immigrant going to do here ? 
He could not survive for a week, nor could his cattle. 
Then how, you ask, do those vast herds of game survive ? 
The bulk of these, I reply, require no water. Nature 
has so designed her creatures that, for many, the 
abundant night-dews suffice to quench thirst. These 
never drink, though some have means of quenching 
thirst in certain bulbous water-bearing roots that they 
dig up from underground. The others migrate. The 
blue wildebeest, for example, and the zebra drink twice 
daily. Both these species may be seen thousands 
strong on the Athi Plains one week or one month; the 
next they have disappeared. Hardly one remains. 
They have moved away—perhaps hundreds of miles 
across country—to the nearest permanent water. The 
sturdiest settler cannot do this. He must stay where he 
is—and die. 
We will assume that our friend the immigrant 
admits these simple facts as regards the Athi Plains. 
He abandons that waterless downland, but still contends 
that he is prohibited from settling in the bush-country 
