Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/419

 during the construction work. Colonel Patterson wrote a book about "The Man Eaters of Tsavo," and its fame is worldwide. The terror of the native workmen on the railway finally became so great that work was suspended for a time. Then one of the engineers fixed up an iron cage, and spent five nights in it. The second night he shot one of the lions, another the third night, and the last one the fifth night. A good many hunters in Africa laugh at the Tsavo story as greatly exaggerated; indeed, I have heard it openly stated here that the Lion Lie is one of the greatest jokes in Africa. Every hunter, the African people say, takes home a fierce lion lie, and the world has come to believe thousands of big stories about these animals that are ridiculous.

—At noon today we left Mombasa for Aden; no more stops for five or six days. Loading at Mombasa continued without interruption for eighteen hours, and when the colored laborers went away on barges, they cheered because of the completion of their long task Outside the harbor, we encountered the first motion of the voyage, and several of the passengers went to bed. The motion was not great, but it was the first we have had. We had been wondering what the "Burgermeister" would do in case of heavy weather, and found her specialty is a pitch. The pitch is far more agreeable than the roll We had been told by the captain to expect the hottest weather of the voyage be