EAST AFRICA

JAN CHRISTIAAN SMUTS

[Sidenote:  Learned South Africa in The Boer War.]

In the strenuous days of the Boer War I learned to know my South Africa from the Indian to the Atlantic Ocean as one learns a country only under the searching test of war.  I came to know the unfrequented paths, the trackless parts of the bush, the wastes where people do not often go.  I believe it is generally admitted that I covered more country than any other commander in the field on either side—­and my movement was not always in the direction of the enemy!

[Sidenote:  Obtaining water on the Kalahari Desert.]

When the present war broke out, I proceeded once more on my extensive travels, and I became something of an expert in the waterless, sandy wastes of the southern half of German Southwest Africa.  As for the Kalahari Desert, over which the movement of men and transport was supposed to be quite impossible, we did not rest until we had sunk bore-holes for water for hundreds of miles, and until we had moved a large force of thousands of mounted men across an area in which it was thought no human being could ever move.  One of the reasons of our success in that campaign was that, moving through the Kalahari Desert, we struck the enemy country at its very heart.  The travels of Livingstone, of Selous, who was a comrade of mine in this war, and of other illustrious men in those vast solitudes of southern Africa were as joy-rides to what we had to undergo in conducting a big campaign against the enemy, and still more against nature.

[Sidenote:  A campaign in East Africa.]

[Sidenote:  Careful study of topography necessary.]

[Sidenote:  Books of travelers all wrong.]

When that campaign was over, and I thought my traveling days were past, the call came to East Africa, and 1916 was spent in traveling over the vast tropical expanses of that fascinating country.  I need scarcely say that a military commander has often very special opportunities of learning geography.  He has to study the country with the eyes not of the scientist or the traveler or the hunter, but of the soldier responsible for the lives and the movements and supplies of large masses of men.  It is one thing to follow the track of the elephant or to stalk the lion or antelope or to collect butterflies or other gorgeous things; it is quite a different and, from the point of view of learning geography, certainly a far more enlightening, task to lead a large army over those virgin solitudes, where your problem involves the careful study not only of topographical features, but of all the numerous natural conditions which affect your progress.  To provide for the needs of a small safari may be a light or delightful task; but the difficulties and requirements of a large force, moving forward against an alert, ubiquitous foe, compel you to probe