You may be sure we had our arrangements, though they did not appear on the surface. The askaris, or native soldiers, were posted here and there with their muskets; the gunbearers also kept our spare weapons by them. The askaris could not hit a barn, but they could make a noise. The gunbearers were fair shots.
Of course the chief and his prime minister came in. They were evil-looking savages. To them we paid not the slightest attention, but went about our usual business as though they did not exist. At the end of an hour they of their own initiative greeted us. We did not hear them. Half an hour later they disappeared, to return after an interval, followed by a string of young men bearing firewood. Evidently our bearing had impressed them, as we had intended. We then unbent far enough to recognize them, carried on a formal conversation for a few moments, gave them adequate presents and dismissed them. Then we ordered the askaris to clear camp and to keep it clear. No women had appeared. Even the gifts of firewood had been carried by men, a most unusual proceeding.
As soon as dark fell the drums began roaring in the forest all about our clearing, and the chanting to rise. We instructed our men to shoot first and inquire afterward, if a shenzi so much as showed himself in the clearing. This was not as bad as it sounded; the shenzi stood in no immediate danger. Then we turned in to a sleep rather light and broken by uncertainty. I do not think we were in any immediate danger of a considered attack, for these people were not openly hostile; but there was always a chance that the savages might by their drum pounding and dancing work themselves into a frenzy. Then we might have to do a little rapid shooting. Not for one instant the whole night long did those misguided savages cease their howling and dancing. At any rate we cost them a night's sleep.
Next morning we took up our march through the deserted tracks once more. Not a sign of human life did we encounter. About ten o'clock we climbed down a tremendous gash of a box canyon with precipitous cliffs. From below we looked back to see, perched high against the skyline, the motionless figures of many savages watching us from the crags. So we had had company after all, and we had not known it. This canyon proved to be the boundary line.
With the same abruptness we passed again into friendly country.
(d) OUT THE OTHER SIDE
We left the jungle finally when we turned on a long angle away from Kenia. At first the open country of the foothills was closely cultivated with fields of **** and maize. We saw some of the people breaking new soil by means of long pointed sticks. The plowmen quite simply inserted the pointed end in the ground and pried. It was very slow hard work. In other fields the grain stood high and good. From among the stalks, as from a miniature jungle, the little naked totos stared out, and the good-natured women smiled at us. The magnificent peak of Kenia had now shaken itself free of the forests. On its snow the sunrises and sunsets kindled their fires. The flames of grass fires, too, could plainly be made out, incredible distances away, and at daytime, through the reek, were fascinating suggestions of distant rivers, plains, jungles, and hills. You see, we were still practically on the wide slope of Kenia's base, though the peak was many days away, and so could look out over wide country.
The last half day of this we wandered literally in a **** field.
The stalks were quite above our heads, and we could see but a few yards in any direction. In addition the track had become a footpath not over two feet wide. We could occasionally look back to catch glimpses of a pack or so bobbing along on a porter's head. From our own path hundreds of other paths branched; we were continually taking the wrong fork and moving back to set the safari right before it could do likewise. This we did by drawing a deep double line in the earth across the wrong trail. Then we hustled on ahead to pioneer the way a little farther; our difficulties were further complicated by the fact that we had sent our horses back to Nairobi for fear of the tsetse fly, so we could not see out above the corn. All we knew was that we ought to go down hill.
At the ends of some of our false trails we came upon fascinating little settlements: groups of houses inside brush enclosures, with low wooden gateways beneath which we had to stoop to enter.
Within were groups of beehive houses with small naked children and perhaps an old woman or old man seated cross-legged under a sort of veranda. From them we obtained new-and confusing-directions.
After three o'clock we came finally out on the edge of a cliff fifty or sixty feet high, below which lay uncultivated bottom lands like a great meadow and a little meandering stream. We descended the cliff, and camped by the meandering stream.