ch. i] PREPARATIONS 19 
a place for the white man, and he must care for himself 
as he would scorn to do in the lands of pine and birch 
and frosty weather. Camping in the Rockies or the 
North Woods can with advantage be combined with 
“ roughing it and the early pioneers of the West, the 
explorers, prospectors, and hunters, who always roughed 
it, were as hardy as bears, and lived to a hale old age, if 
Indians and accidents permitted. But in tropical Africa 
a lamentable proportion of the early explorers paid in 
health or life for the hardships they endured ; and 
throughout most of the country no man can long rough 
it, in the Western and Northern sense, with impunity. 
At Kapiti Plains our tents, our accommodation 
generally, seemed almost too comfortable for men who 
knew camp life only on the Great Plains, in the 
Rockies, and in the North Woods. My tent had a fly, 
which was to protect it from the great heat ; there was 
a little rear extension in which I bathed—a hot bath, 
never a cold bath, is almost a tropic necessity ; there 
was a ground canvas, of vital moment in a land of ticks, 
jiggers, and scorpions ; and a cot to sleep on, so as to 
be raised from the ground. Quite a contrast to life on 
the round-up ! Then, I had two tent-boys to see after 
my belongings, and to wait at table as well as in the 
tent. Ali, a Mohammedan mulatto (Arab and negro), 
was the chief of the two, and spoke some English, while 
under him was “ Bill,” a speechless black boy, Ali 
being particularly faithful and efficient. Two other 
Mohammedan negroes, clad like the askaris, reported to 
me as my gun-bearers, Muhammed and Bakiri; seemingly 
excellent men, loyal and enduring, no trackers, but with 
keen eyes for game, and the former speaking a little 
English. My two horse-boys, or saises, were both 
pagans. One, Hamisi, must have had in his veins Galla 
