It is then pierced and decorated in various
ways - by sticking through it a piece of wood
two or three inches in diameter, or a little round
tin canister, and by hanging to it pieces of chain,
rings, beads, or bunches of brass-headed nails,
according to fancy. Nearly all the men wear
little bells on their ankles to give notice of their
approach, while the women are very fond of
covering themselves with large quantities of
iron or copper wire. Their limbs, indeed, are
often almost completely encased with these rings,
which I should think must be very heavy and
uncomfortable: but no Masai woman considers
herself a lady of fashion without them, and the
more she possesses the higher does she stand
in the social scale.
As a rule, the Masai do not bury their dead,
as they consider this custom to be prejudicial to
the soil; the bodies are simply carried some
little distance from the village and left to be
devoured by birds and wild beasts. The honour
of burial is reserved only for a great chief,
over whose remains a large mound is also raised.
I came across one of these mounds one day
near Tsavo and opened it very carefully, but
found nothing: possibly I did not pursue my
search deep enough into the earth. In general,
the Masai are an upright and honourable savage
race, and it is a great pity that they are gradually
dying out.
More or less serfs of the Masai are the
Wa N'derobbo, who, unlike their over-lords, are a
race of hunters. They are seldom to be met with,
however, as they hide away in caves and thickets,
and keep constantly moving from place to place
following the game. Not long ago I saw a few of
them in the neighbourhood of the Eldama Ravine:
but these were more or less civilised, and the
girls, who were quite graceful, had abandoned the
native undress costume for flowing white robes.
In the district from Nairobi to the Kedong
River, and in the Kenya Province, dwell the
Wa Kikuyu, who are similar to the Masai in
build, but not nearly so good-looking. Like the
latter, they use the spear and shield, though
of a different shape; their principal weapon,
however, is the bow and poisoned arrow. They
also frequently carry a rudely made two-edged
short sword in a sheath, which is slung round
the waist by a belt of raw hide. Their front
teeth are filed to a sharp point in the same
manner as those of nearly all the other native
tribes of East Africa, with the exception of the
Masai. They live in little villages composed
of beehive huts and always situated in the very
thickest patches of forest that they can find, and
their cattle kraals are especially strongly built
and carefully hidden. On one occasion I managed
after a great deal of difficulty and crawling on
all-fours to make my way into one of these
kraals, and was much amazed to notice what
labour and ingenuity had been expended on its
construction. Unlike the Masai, the Wa Kikuyu
have a fairly good idea of agriculture, and grow
crops of m'tama (a kind of native grain from
which flour is made), sugar-cane, sweet potatoes,
and tobacco.
The Wa Kikuyu have the reputation of being
a very cowardly and treacherous people, and
they have undoubtedly committed some very
cruel deeds. A friend of mine, Captain Haslem,
with whom I lived for a few months at Tsavo,
was barbarously murdered by some members of
this tribe. He left me to go up to the Kikuyu
country in charge of the transport, and as he
was keenly interested in finding out all about
the tropical diseases from which the animals
suffered, he made it his custom to dissect the
bodies of those that died. The superstitious
Wa Kikuyu were fully convinced that by this
he bewitched their cattle, which at the time were
dying in scores from rinderpest. So - instigated
no doubt by the all-powerful witch-doctor - they
treacherously killed him. For my part, however,
I found them not nearly so black as they had been
painted to me. I had about four hundred of them
working at one thing or another at Nairobi and
never had any trouble with them. On the contrary
I found them well-behaved and intelligent and
most anxious to learn.
As is the case with all other African races,
the women of the Wa Kikuyu do the manual
labour of the village and carry the heavy loads
for their lords and masters, the bundles being
held in position on their back by a strap passing
round the forehead.
Notwithstanding this some of them are quite
pleasant looking, and once they have overcome
their fear of the European, do not object to being
photographed.
Of the other tribes to be met with in this part
of the world, the Kavirondo are the most
interesting. They are an industrious, simple people,
devoted to agriculture and hospitable in the
extreme - a little addicted to thieving, perhaps,
but then that is scarcely considered a sin in the
heart of Africa. They are clothed (to use Mark
Twain's expression) in little but a smile, a bead
or two here and there being considered ample
raiment; nevertheless they are modest in their
ways and are on the whole about the best of
the East African tribes.
CHAPTER XXII
HOW ROSHAN KHAN SAVED MY LIFE
On May 12 railhead reached the Athi River,
where, as there was a great deal of miscellaneous
work to be done, our headquarters remained
established for some little time.
