WORK AT NAIROBI
Although the lion which caused poor Bhoota's death was the last I
managed to shoot in East Africa, I saw several others afterwards while
travelling up and down the line at different times on construction
work. In particular, I remember one very curious incident which
happened early on the morning of June 2, when I was travelling towards
Nairobi, accompanied by Dr. McCulloch. The Doctor was going home on
leave in the course of a few days, and was bemoaning to me his bad luck
in never having shot or even seen a lion all the time he had been in
the country. We were standing on the engine at the time, facing each
other, he with his back to the north.
"My dear Mac," I said, "it is because you don't look out for them."
"Rubbish," he retorted; "I do nothing else when I am out hunting."
"Well," I replied, "are you really very anxious to shoot one before you
go home?"
"I would rather get a lion than anything else in the world," was the
emphatic reply.
"Very good, then. Sultan," I called to the driver, "stop the engine."
"Now, Mac," I continued, as the train was quickly brought to a
standstill, "here's a chance for you. Just jump off and bag those two
over there."
He turned round in blank astonishment and could hardly believe his eyes
when he saw two fine lions only about two hundred yards off, busily
engaged in devouring a wildebeeste which they had evidently just
killed. I had spotted them almost as soon as Mac had begun to talk of
his bad luck, and had only waited to tell him until we got nearer, so
as to give him a greater surprise. He was off the engine in a second
and made directly for the two beasts. Just as he was about to fire one
of them bolted, so I called out to him to shoot the other quickly
before he too made good his escape. This one was looking at us over his
shoulder with one paw on the dead wildebeeste, and while he stood in
this attitude Mac dropped him with a bullet through the heart. Needless
to say he was tremendously delighted with his success, and after the
dead lion had been carried to the train and propped up against a
carriage, I took a photograph of him standing beside his fine trophy.
Three days after this incident railhead reached Nairobi, and I was
given charge of the new division of the line. Nairobi was to be the
headquarters of the Railway Administration, so there was an immense
amount of work to be done in converting an absolutely bare plain, three
hundred and twenty-seven miles from the nearest place where even a nail
could be purchased, into a busy railway centre. Roads and bridges had
to be constructed, houses and work-shops built, turntables and station
quarters erected, a water supply laid on, and a hundred and one other
things done which go to the making of a railway township. Wonderfully
soon, however, the nucleus of the present town began to take shape, and
a thriving "bazaar" sprang into existence with a mushroom-like growth.
In this, however, a case or two of plague broke out before very long,
so I gave the natives and Indians who inhabited it an hour's notice to
clear out, and on my own responsibility promptly burned the whole place
to the ground. For this somewhat arbitrary proceeding I was mildly
called over the coals, as I expected; but all the same it effectually
stamped out the plague, which did not reappear during the time I was in
the country.
With a little persuasion I managed to induce several hundred of the Wa
Kikuyu, in whose country we now were, to come and work at Nairobi, and
very useful and capable they proved themselves after a little training.
They frequently brought me in word that the shambas (plantations,
gardens) at the back of the hill on which my camp was pitched were
being destroyed by elephants, but unfortunately I could never spare
time to go out in quest of them. On one occasion, however, I passed the
news on to my friend, Dr. Winston Waters, with the result that he had a
most exciting adventure with a big bull elephant. He set out in quest
of the depredator, and, guided by a few of the Wa Kikuyu, soon came
upon him hidden among some shady trees. Waters was a great believer in
a close shot, so he stalked up to within a few yards of the animal and
then fired his .577, aiming for the heart. The elephant responded by a
prompt and determined charge, and although Waters quickly let him have
the left barrel as well, it proved of no effect; and on he came,
screaming and trumpeting with rage. There was nothing for it,
therefore, but to fly for dear life; so down a path raced Waters for
all he was worth, the elephant giving vigorous chase and gaining
rapidly. In a few seconds matters began to look very serious for the
sportsman, for the huge monster was almost on him; but at the critical
moment he stepped on to the false cover of a carefully-concealed game
pit and disappeared from view as if by magic. This sudden descent of
his enemy apparently into the bowels of the earth so startled the
elephant that he stopped short in his career and made off into the
jungle. As for Waters, he was luckily none the worse for his fall, as
the pit was neither staked at the bottom nor very deep; he soon
scrambled out, and, following up the wounded elephant, succeeded in
finishing him off without further trouble.
Towards the end of 1899 I left for England. A few days before I started
all my Wa Kikuyu "children", as they called themselves, came in a body
and begged to be taken with me. I pictured to them the cold, wet
climate of England and its great distance from their native land; but
they assured me that these were nothing to them, as they only wished to
continue my "children" and to go wherever I went. I could hardly
imagine myself arriving in London with a body-guard of four hundred
more or less naked savages, but it was only with difficulty that I
persuaded them that they had better remain in their own country. The
ever-faithful Mahina, my "boy" Roshan Khan, my honest chaukidar,
Meeanh, and a few other coolies who had been a long time with me,
accompanied me to the coast, where they bade me a sorrowful farewell
and left for India the day before I sailed on my homeward journey.