MERU

The Government post at Meru is situated in a clearing won from the
forest on the first gentle slopes of Kenia's ranges. The clearing is a
very large one, and on it the grass grows green and short, like a lawn.
It resembles, as much as anything else, the rolling, beautiful downs
of a first-class country club, and the illusion is enhanced by the
Commissioner's house among some trees atop a hill. Well-kept roadways
railed with rustic fences lead from the house to the native quarters
lying in the hollow and to the Government offices atop another hill.
Then also there are the quarters of the Nubian troops; round low houses
with conical grass roofs.

These, and the presence everywhere of savages, rather take away from
the first country-club effect. A corral seemed full of a seething mob of
natives; we found later that this was the market, a place of exchange.
Groups wandered idly here and there across the greensward; and other
groups sat in circles under the shade of trees, each man's spear stuck
in the ground behind him. At stated points were the Nubians, fine, tall,
black, soldierly men, with red fez, khaki shirt, and short breeches,
bare knees and feet, spiral puttees, and a broad red sash of webbing.
One of these soldiers assigned us a place to camp. We directed our
safari there, and then immediately rode over to pay our respects to the
Commissioner.

The latter, Horne by name, greeted us with the utmost cordiality, and
offered us cool drinks. Then we accompanied him to a grand shauri or
council of chiefs.

Horne was a little chap, dressed in flannels and a big slouch hat,
carrying only a light rawhide whip, with very little of the dignity and
"side" usually considered necessary in dealing with wild natives. The
post at Meru had been established only two years, among a people that
had always been very difficult, and had only recently ceased open
hostilities. Nevertheless in that length of time Horne's personal
influence had won them over to positive friendliness. He had, moreover,
done the entire construction work of the post itself; and this we now
saw to be even more elaborate than we had at first realized. Irrigating
ditches ran in all directions brimming with clear mountain water; the
roads and paths were rounded, graded and gravelled; the houses were
substantial, well built and well kept; fences, except of course the
rustic, were whitewashed; the native quarters and "barracks" were well
ranged and in perfe