a
bad one, as natural mountain roads go; I have myself driven worse in
California. Our man, however, liked to exaggerate all the difficulties,
and while doing it to point to himself with pride as a perfect wonder.
Between times he talked elementary mechanics.

"The inflammation of the sparkling plugs?" was one of his expressions
that did much to compensate.

The country mounted steadily through the densest thorn scrub I have ever
seen. It was about fifteen feet high, and so thick that its penetration,
save by made tracks, would have been an absolute impossibility. Our road
ran like a lane between two spiky jungles. Bold bright mountains cropped
up, singly and in short ranges, as far as the eye could see them.

This sort of thing for twenty miles--more than a hard day's journey on
safari. We made it in a little less than two hours; and the breeze of
our going kept us reasonably cool under our awning. We began to
appreciate the real value of our diplomacy.

At noon we came upon a series of unexpectedly green and clear small
hills just under the frown of a sheer rock cliff. This oasis in the
thorn was occupied by a few scattered native huts and the usual squalid
Indian dukka, or trading store. At this last our German friend stopped.
From under the seat he drew out a collapsible table and a basket of
provisions. These we were invited to share. Diplomacy's highest triumph!

After lunch we surmounted our first steep grade to the top of a ridge.
This we found to be the beginning of a long elevated plateau sweeping
gently downward to a distant heat mist, which later experience proved a
concealment to snowcapped Kilimanjaro. This plateau also looked to be
covered with scrub. As we penetrated it, however, we found the bushes
were more or less scattered, while in the wide, shallow dips between the
undulations were open grassy meadows. There was no water. Isolated
mountains or peaked hills showed here and there in the illimitable
spaces, some of them fairly hull down, all of them toilsomely distant.
This was the Serengetti itself.

In this great extent of country somewhere were game herds. They were
exceedingly migratory, and nobody knew very much about them. One of the
species would be the rare and localized fringe-eared oryx. This beast
was the principal zoological end of our expedition; though, of course,
as always, we hoped for a chance lion. Geographically we wished to find
the source of the Swanee River, and to follow t