FOOTNOTES:

[28] V.'s native name--the Master with the Red Beard.




XLIII.

THE TOPI CAMP.


At the next camp we stayed for nearly a week.

The country was charming. Mountains surrounded the long ellipse, near
one edge of which we had pitched our tents. The ellipse was some ten
miles long by four or five wide, and its surface rolled in easy billows
to a narrow neck at the lower end. There we could just make out in the
far distance a conical hill partly closing the neck. Atop the hill was a
Masai manyatta, very tiny, with indistinct crawling red and brown
blotches that meant cattle and sheep. Beyond the hill, and through the
opening in the ellipse, we could see to another new country of hills and
meadows and forest groves. In this clear air they were microscopically
distinct. No blue of atmosphere nor shimmer of heat blurred their
outlines. They were merely made small.

Our camp was made in the open above a tiny stream. We saw wonderful
sunrises and sunsets, and always spread out before us was the sweep of
our plains and the unbroken ramparts that hemmed us in. From these