Most Somalis wear the long tobe in various degrees of cleanliness. The real dandy affects a garment of dazzling whiteness. Less particular people carry on until the tobe is filthy. I imagine the cloth hails from Manchester. It is cotton sheeting, several feet in length, and put on according to the taste and fancy, artistic, original, or otherwise, of the wearer. It is a graceful costume, Cæsar-like and imposing. At night it is not removed, and seen by the light of the fire each sleeping Somali looks like nothing so much as some great cocoon.
A praying carpet is considered an indispensable part of the Somali equipment. It isn’t really a carpet at all, being nothing in the wide world but a piece of tanned hide or skin. Some of our men spent a good deal of time on the mat, prostrating themselves at the most untoward moments. Others again did not seem to have got religion, and never called the thing into use at all. But to every one of them Allah was a something impossible to get along without entirely. If there had been no Allah or Kismet to put all the blame on to when everything went wrong, we should have been in an awkward place indeed.
It was at this encampment I purchased two more ponies, not beautiful to look at but beggars to go.
We tried them first, fearing to be done again, and they seemed willing little fellows, and full of life. Most of the tribes breed ponies on a small or large scale, and as they are never groomed or tidied up at all they cannot help a somewhat unkempt appearance. We bought a few sheep for food, and were presented with a dirty harn full of camels’ milk, horrid tasting stuff, which we handed over to the men, and so didn’t desert our “Nestlé” for it. Going among the squalid tents in the karia we found a woman in a sad state of collapse, although nobody seemed to mind it save ourselves. More of the Kismet business. She had a wee baby, a few hours old, lying on the herio beside her. The whole scene was primitive and pathetic to a degree. I am glad to say we improved matters considerably.
Although water was very scarce, we spared enough from our store to tub the quaint little baby, going first back to our tents to procure soap and a few other things. We dressed the mite in a white vest, in which it was completely lost, to the interest and astonishment of a jury of matrons who stood around us, ever and again feeling some part of our clothing, tying and untying our boot laces, and even going the length of putting inquisitive hands into our pockets. For the mother of His Majesty the Baby we opened our first bottle of emergency champagne. A right thinking Somali is dead against strong drink of any kind, spirits being entirely taboo, so we thought it safer and more diplomatic to refer to the champagne as medicine. The bang it opened with astonished the listless crowds, and the effect as the good wine did its work astonished them still more.
We presented the headman with a tobe, and then took ourselves back to camp, accompanied by a rabble of Somalis who infested our zareba until we struck tents that evening. I had as much of a bath as it was possible to get in a tea-cupful of water. But a visit to a Somali encampment makes you feel a trifle dirty.
Our water supply was on the verge of becoming a worry, so we had to make a detour towards a place where rain was reported to have fallen and the pools could be counted on. Clarence knew all this part of the country well, and was a most reliable guide as well as everything else. His duties were multitudinous, and it was marvellous how deftly he discharged them. He always saw to the lading and unloading, chose the spot for camp, placed the watch o’ nights, gave out the stores, and kept his temper through it all. He was a born leader of men, amiable, quick and never sulked; an admirable thing. Sulkiness is rather a big trait in the Somali character; it usually springs from wounded vanity.
At the water holes we fell in with some more Somalis, who gave the Baron Munchausen news of lions in the vicinity. By the time our henchman had elaborated the story the lions were practically in our zareba, and we were much discouraged, feeling that, in all human probability, judging by previous results, we were as far off lions as ever.
That night, after a somewhat longer, more tiring trek than usual, for the first time in my life I heard a lion roar. I say for the first time, because in my superiority I tell you that the grunting, short, peevish crying heard in the great cat house at the Zoo at feeding-time cannot be called roaring, after one has heard the wonderful sound of His Majesty hunting. My heart seemed to stand still with awe as I listened to that never-to-be-forgotten sound. Terrific and majestic, it reverberated through the silence of the night, and seemed to repeat itself in echoes when all was really still.
The dawn is the time when lions roar most. They occasionally give tongue when actually hunting, often after feeding. The sound varies with the age and lung power of the animal, and has many gradations, sometimes sounding as though the pain of doing it at all hurt the throat, sometimes the sound comes in great abrupt coughs, and again one hears even triumphant roars.