in our lounging chairs, one hand
on our cool long drinks.

FOOTNOTES:

[4] For a fuller discussion, see "The Land of Footprints."

XII.

THE FIRE.

We were very tired, so we turned in early. W Unfortunately, our rooms
were immediately over the billiard room, where a bibulous and
cosmopolitan lot were earnestly endeavouring to bolster up by further
proof the fiction that a white man cannot retain his health in the
tropics. The process was pretty rackety, and while it could not keep us
awake, it prevented us from falling thoroughly asleep. At length, and
suddenly, the props of noise fell away from me, and I sank into a
grateful, profound abyss.

Almost at once, however, I was dragged back to consciousness. Mohammed
stood at my bedside.

"Bwana," he proffered to my rather angry inquiry, "all the people have
gone to the fire. It is a very large fire. I thought you would like to
see it."

I glanced out of the window at the reddening sky, thrust my feet into a
pair of slippers, and went forth in my pyjamas to see what I could see.

We threaded our way through many narrow dark and deserted streets,
beneath balconies that overhung, past walls over which nodded tufted
palms, until a loud and increasing murmuring told us we were nearing the
centre of disturbance. Shortly, we came to the outskirts of the excited
crowd, and beyond them saw the red furnace glow.

"Semeelay! Semeelay!" warned Mohammed authoritatively; and the
bystanders, seeing a white face, gave me passage.

All of picturesque Mombasa was afoot--Arabs, Swahilis, Somalis, savages,
Indians--the whole lot. They moved restlessly in the narrow streets;
they hung over the edges of balconies; they peered from barred windows;
interested dark faces turned up everywhere in the flickering light. One
woman, a fine, erect, biblical figure, stood silhouetted on a flat
housetop and screamed steadily. I thought she must have at least one
baby in the fire, but it seems she was only excited.

The fire was at present confined to two buildings, in which it was
raging fiercely. Its spread, however, seemed certain; and, as it was
surrounded by warehouses of valuable goods, moving was in full swing. A
frantic white man stood at the low doorway of one of these dungeon-like
stores hastening the movements of an unending string of porters. As each
emerged bearing a case on his shoulder, the white man urged him to a
trot. I followed up the street to see where these val