United States or Jersey ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !


There were between forty and fifty of them, and from the number of totos, or calves, we assumed that many of the big ones were cows. We studied the herd for some minutes, estimating the ivory and trying in vain to pick out the bulls. There is very little difference between the appearance of a cow and a bull elephant when the latter has only moderate-sized tusks.

On reaching camp totos had several clearly defined duties: they must pick out good places for their masters' individual camps, they must procure cooking stones, they must collect kindling wood and start fires, they must fill the sufurias with water and set them over to boil. In the meantime, their masters were attending to the pitching of the bwana's camp.

One of my most vivid camp recollections is that of M'ganga, very benign and didactic, seated on a chop box and holding forth to a semicircle of totos squatted on the ground before him.

As the quintette came to halt, the villagers fell silent and our shauri began. We drew up and dismounted. We all expectorated as gentlemen. "These," said he proudly, "are my beebees." We replied that they seemed like excellent beebees and politely inquired the price of wives thereabout, and also the market for totos.

From among the stalks, as from a miniature jungle, the little naked totos stared out, and the good-natured women smiled at us. The magnificent peak of Kenia had now shaken itself free of the forests. On its snow the sunrises and sunsets kindled their fires.

The rest of the time the toto played about quite happily, and did light odd jobs, or watched most attentively while his master showed him small details of a safari-boy's duty, or taught him simple handicraft. Our boys seemed to take great pains with their totos and to try hard to teach them. Also at Meru we had acquired two cocks and four hens of the ridiculously small native breed.

As was expected, the herd consisted solely of cows and calves. There were eight cow elephants and two totos, or calves, a circumstance that was particularly fortunate, as Colonel Roosevelt was expected to secure one or two cows for the group, while some one else was to get the calf.

We were riding ahead, followed by the cook and the tent boys, and behind them was the long string of a hundred or more porters, askaris, totos, and so forth. The end of the line was some hundred yards behind the head. Suddenly there was a wild cry of "faru!"

About three miles out, we lost one of our newly acquired totos. Reason: an exasperated parent who had followed from Meru for the purpose of reclaiming his runaway offspring. The latter was dragged off howling. Evidently he, like some of his civilized cousins, had "run away to join the circus."

As nearly as we could get at it, the rest of the totos, as well as the nine additional we picked up before we quitted the jungle, had all come with their parents' consent. The road was very much up and down hill over the numerous ridges that star-fish out from Mt. Kenia. The trails of course had no notion of easy grades.