EAST AFRICA AND ITS BIG GAME. 
i 70 
but, as a compromise, agreed that, whenever we happened 
to be at our Taveta headquarters, they should leave off 
for the day at noon, an arrangement which would 
enable us to get a good six hours’ work out of them 
when necessary. This agreement—the Sundays thrown 
in as whole-holidays—was fair enough, and they were 
satisfied. 
We found that we should have to stop a week at 
Taveta before starting in the direction of Mount Meru, 
as more supplies had to be collected and our trade 
beads made up in strings. Food, for some reason or 
other, seemed to have become a very scarce commodity, 
or else the Wa-taveta were attempting an extortion, 
as they now asked double prices for loads of grain 
and bananas. We rather upset their market by send¬ 
ing off fifty men to Ughono to buy food there, and, 
after a three days’ absence, they came back with thirty- 
three loads, to the discomfiture of the Wa-taveta who 
at once came down to their old prices. Our men also 
brought back two hens—a great luxury and rarity in 
these parts. They reported tlmt a Swahili caravan, 
forty strong, had been attacked near Lake Jipe by 
Masai, who had killed several and stolen all their 
goods. The surprised Swahili of course took to their 
heels and fled to the Ughono people for refuge, but 
it was the idea of Martin and Caeeche that the original 
attack was made by some of the Wa-ughono, disguised 
as Masai, for Caeeche had noticed a great deal of new 
cloth amongst them, and when he suggested bringing 
the refugees back with him to Taveta, he was told 
