However, as I have already said, all those who have the true interests of British East Africa at heart are hoping for a better state of things under the experienced and enlightened administration of Sir Percy Girouard.
After the fiasco of my trial, I returned to Karuri’s, and continued my food-buying, taking the supplies into Naivasha as before. I still experienced the same trouble with the Kalyera natives on the way down with the food for the Government stations, and finally the matter was reported to the Governor, Sir Charles Eliot, who resided at Zanzibar, which was then the headquarters of the Government. As a result of these representations, an expedition was sent out under Captain Wake, of the East African Rifles, with Mr. McLellan as civil officer, and I was asked to accompany them as guide and intelligence officer. I was only too pleased to have this opportunity of proving to the Government my readiness to help, and I willingly agreed to go with the expedition.
CHAPTER XI
Origin of the Kikuyu—The family—Circumcision—Marriage—Land tenure—Missionaries
It may be of interest to the general reader if I give, in a single chapter, a brief account of the manners and customs of the Kikuyu people, and some description of the country in which they live. It must be borne in mind that the information contained in this section is not the result of direct questioning of the people, as it is well known to all who have any real knowledge of the African native that to ask directly for information of this sort from him simply results in the acquisition of a large amount of information which, however interesting it may be to read, contains the smallest possible proportion of actual truth. Therefore, the account of the Kikuyu and their country given in the following pages is the result of my own personal knowledge and observation during the period of my residence among them. It may not be as picturesque as some other published accounts, but I am prepared to vouch for its accuracy.
Owing to the fact that no accurate map of this part of Africa has yet been prepared, it is a matter of some difficulty to give exactly the boundaries and dimensions of the Kikuyu country; but, roughly speaking, it is bounded on the north by a line which almost coincides with the Equator; on the west by the Aberdare Range, a range of bamboo-covered hills, uninhabited by any tribe; on the south by a kind of debatable land, forming part of the Athi Plain, extending from Nairobi to Fort Hall, to the south of which lies the Wakamba country; on the east, for a considerable distance by the Tana River, beyond which it only extends for a short distance towards the north-east. These boundaries may have been somewhat modified since the opening up of the country by the Government of British East Africa, but in the main they are still correct. The area of this district would be about four thousand square miles.
As I never attempted to take any sort of census during my “reign,” I can only give approximately the population, but I should say, as far as I was able to ascertain, that the total number of the tribe would be about half a million—rather more than less—of whom the women outnumbered the men considerably, the constant warfare tending to keep the number of the male population at a fairly steady figure.
The accounts given of the origin of the Kikuyu tribe vary considerably, and the nigger’s talent for fiction, and his readiness to oblige any one—particularly a white man—who asks for a legend, make it extremely difficult to distinguish where truth ends and fiction begins; but I will give the two principal accounts as they were given to me, and my own opinion of the credibility of both, and let the reader judge for himself.
The first story is that given me by Karuri, the chief who was my first friend among these interesting people, who was certainly one of the most intelligent natives I have ever come in contact with. His account was that the original inhabitants of the country, a tribe called the Asi, were hunters who took no interest in agriculture, and that the Kikuyu were a tribe who came into the country, and purchased tracts of land from the Asi for purposes of cultivation. Gradually more and more of the Kikuyu came in until they had cleared most of the forest land of which the country originally consisted, while the Asi were gradually absorbed into the Kikuyu tribe by marriage, or wandered farther afield in search of the game which the increasing population and the clearing of the forests had driven away to new retreats. Karuri himself based his strongest claim to his chieftaincy on the fact that he was a direct descendant of these Asi.
The other account, which was given me by a headman named Kasu, now a powerful chief under the new regime, reminds one somewhat of the story of Ishmael. The legend runs that a Masai warrior, living on the borders of what is now the Kikuyu country, but was then a vast forest, inhabited by a race of dwarfs, of whom the Kikuyu speak as the Maswatch-wanya, was in the habit of ill-treating one of his wives to such an extent that she used from time to time to take refuge among the dwarfs, returning to her husband’s kraal after each flight. Finally his treatment became so bad that she fled to the dwarfs and remained there, giving birth to a son shortly after her definite settlement among them. Later on, the story runs, she had children to her own son, which children intermarried with the Maswatch-wanya, and from their offspring the present Kikuyu race derive their descent.