THE START—MOMBASA TO TAITA. 
silence pervaded tlie camp. The liead-man of the 
caravan was squatted outside the tent patiently awaiting 
my awakening. The Indian servant and the senior 
cook were busily preparing breakfast, while just sufficient 
men remained behind to carry my tent, bed, and cook¬ 
ing apparatus. 
Learning the cause of my porters’ disappearance, 
and far from disapproving such unaccustomed and 
unprompted activity, I hastily dressed, swallowed 
my breakfast, and also prepared myself for the long 
journey that lay before us. The bright slanting 
beams of an hour-old sun lit up the landscape so cheer¬ 
fully that the purpose of covering thirty-two miles by 
nightfall seemed both feasible and easy of accomplish¬ 
ment. The air was fresh and buoyant, and either my 
potion of the night before or the change from the hot¬ 
house atmosphere of the coast to a more bracing 
climate had brought back strength to my limbs and 
courage to my heart, for I stepped out along the red 
path at three miles an hour and enjoyed the exercise. 
This rate of progress soon brought me up to the rear¬ 
guard of those who had started with the earliest dawn, 
but whose energy had waned after two or three hours’ 
hard tramp. Already, with stupid resignation, many 
were stretching themselves by the wayside, having first, 
to satisfy a moderate thirst, consumed in several gulps 
the remainder of the drinking-water which was to 
carry them through the day ; and, this finished, they 
were prepared to lie down in utter hopelessness, feeling 
themselves unequal to the task of walking twenty-five 
miles to the next water-supply or twenty-five miles 
back to the last. 
I should parenthetically remark that these East 
Coast porters, like most Africans, are utterly without 
