84 
RHINO AND GIRAFFES [ch. iv 
In the next line were the cook tent, the provision tent, 
the store tent, the skinning tent, and the like ; and then 
came the lines of small white tents for the porters. 
Between each row of tents was a broad street. In front 
of our own tents, in the first line, an askari was always 
pacing to and fro ; and when night fell we would kindle 
a camp-fire and sit around it under the stars. Before 
each of the porters’ tents was a little fire, and beside it 
stood the pots and pans in which the porters did their 
cooking. Here and there were larger fires, around which 
the gun-bearers or a group of askaris or of saises might 
gather. After nightfall the multitude of fires lit up the 
darkness and showed the tents in shadowy outline ; and 
around them squatted the porters, their faces flickering 
from dusk to ruddy light, as they chatted together or 
suddenly started some snatch of wild African melody in 
which all their neighbours might join. After a while 
the talk and laughter and singing would gradually die 
away, and as we white men sat around our fire the 
silence would be unbroken except by the queer cry of 
a hyena, or much more rarely by a sound that always 
demanded attention—the yawning grunt of a questing 
lion. 
If we wished to make an early start we would break¬ 
fast by dawn, and then we often returned to camp for 
lunch. Otherwise we would usually be absent all day, 
carrying our lunch with us. We might get in before 
sunset or we might be out till long after nightfall; and 
then the gleam of the lit fires was a welcome sight as 
we stumbled toward them through the darkness. Once 
in, each went to his tent to take a hot bath ; and 
then, clean and refreshed, we sat down to a comfortable 
dinner, with game of some sort as the principal dish. 
On the first march after leaving our lion camp at 
