THE PORTERS DETECTED IN STEALING MEAT. 253 
Taveta, every one of tlie porters tried to steal as much 
meat as he could carry in addition to his load. Every 
pound of meat at Taveta meant so much money, and 
money meant unlimited \oombe and the indulgence of 
all vices ; consequently, if not properly backed up by 
one’s head-men, it was very difficult to get any meat 
carried back for our own use. 
I therefore, before making a start, inspected each 
load, for of course Caceche informed me that there 
were not enough men to carry twelve loads of meat, 
and wanted to leave it behind—an assertion which, on 
the face of it, was too ridiculous, considering that we 
had altogether seventy men with us to carry eleven 
loads of heads and head-skins, and about thirty loads 
of personal luggage and camp equipment. These last, 
I found had been converted into fifty light loads, their 
proper weight of sixty to seventy lbs. being made up 
with the meat that they had sneaked ; so I at once 
deprived each man of a portion of his ill-gotten gains, 
and then rearranging the loads, succeeded in getting all 
the general store of meat carried back to Taveta. The 
men who had joined us in the early morning said that 
they had seen three elephants near the north end of 
the lake, but we saw no signs of them on our way 
home, and during the whole return journey only 
succeeded in bagging one solitary snipe. 
On our arriving at Taveta after a four and a half 
hours’ march, we found that B- and Id- had 
returned from Ithombu the day before, after having- 
excellent sport. Their bag amounted to forty-one 
