[46] Between the Tug Fáfan and Milmil we were very much annoyed by two kinds of gadfly, the camels, whenever they were halted, throwing themselves down and rolling, with the result that a great deal of kit was broken. There are two kinds—the balaad, a small, grayish black fly the size of a common house-fly, with triangular wings, very dangerous to camels, often causing eventual death; and the dúg, as large as a bumblebee, which stings both men and animals, and is present in great numbers, only ceasing its persecutions by night. It is not so dangerous to camels as balaad. I learned, on sending specimens to be examined at the British Museum, that neither of these flies have anything whatever to do with the “Tsetse” of South Africa, which belongs to an entirely different family.
[47] These people are a great encumbrance in the movable karias of the nomads, and if they stay there, unless they have relations who will befriend them, they soon die, or are eaten up by the packs of hyænas which haunt the outskirts of the encampments at night. In the hope of gaining a permanent sanctuary they travel painfully great distances to the nearest mullah villages; hence the large number of cripples and sick that are to be found in these settlements.
[48] I call this tree the casuarina, because of its resemblance to a tree so called which is common in India. Having lost my botanical collection in the Webbe I cannot accurately identify it.
[49] The various kinds of game, although unable to get at the water lying at the bottom of the deep wells, visit them at night on the chance of finding water standing at the surface, left in the excavated clay troughs after flocks have been watered.
[50] The people here played a characteristic pleasantry upon me. I found it difficult to buy a sheep, and had quite given up all hope of getting mutton for my men, when one was at last driven up to my tent; the owner of the sheep said he had heard I wanted one, and that having been some distance off he could not come till now. I bought the sheep for two pieces of cloth. Half an hour later its throat began to swell up, and my men showed the marks where it had been bitten by an abéso, a very poisonous snake, whilst grazing. Half an hour later it was dead, its neck having swollen to a tremendous size. By this time, of course, the owner of the sheep had vanished!
[51] The bush being chiefly of low, flat-topped mimósas, spreading into foliage about four feet from the ground, a man walking erect has little chance of seeing the game first, unless he stops and bends down to look along the ground at every few paces.
[52] Many Arabic words are incorporated into the Somáli language, and many more are used by Somális only when talking to strangers.
[53] Of these Somáli antelopes, no less than five have been described as new species since 1891, namely, hartebeest, Clarke’s antelope, the red hill antelope called Baira, and three dwarf antelopes of the genus Madoqua.
[54] Rusa aristotelis.
[55] Not long after my second visit to the Webbe, Major Wood pushed into the country across the river, and was successful in bringing to England the trophies of these giraffes.