Another custom common to both the Masai and Kikuyu, though not practised by the Wakamba, is that of wearing the most extraordinary ear ornaments, which, as mentioned earlier in the book, are sometimes as large as a condensed milk tin, and are worn passed through holes specially made in the lobe of the ear. The practice is to pierce the lobe of the boys’ ears some time in early childhood, and from that time onwards the aperture then made is gradually enlarged by the wearing of a succession of wooden plugs or discs of graduated sizes, until an object as large as a large-sized condensed milk tin can be easily passed through it. This operation extends over some years, and the natural result is to convert the ring of flesh into what looks like—and as far as feeling is concerned, might as well be—a leather loop, which sometimes hangs down far enough to touch the shoulder. It is the great ambition of every Kikuyu youth to be able to wear a bigger ear ornament than his neighbour, and, in order to attain the desired end, I have known them to pass a straight stick of wood through the hole in the lobe of one ear, across the back of the neck, through the lobe of the other, thus keeping them both constantly stretched.
The country itself is very rough, and it is often a matter of difficulty to find a level piece sufficiently large to pitch one’s camp on. It is situated at an elevation of some six thousand feet above sea-level, and consists of a series of ranges of low hills, divided by deep valleys, through most of which flows a stream of greater or less magnitude, none of which ever seem to become quite dried up, even in the driest of dry seasons. On account of the comparatively temperate climate, due to the elevation, and of the extreme fertility of the soil, the country is an ideal spot for the native agriculturist, who gets his two crops a year with a minimum of labour. Consequently the country is very thickly populated; in fact, I do not know any part where, on raising the tribal war-cry, I could not, in an extremely short space of time, gather at least a couple of thousand fighting men. The principal crops are the sweet potato, _kigwa_ (a kind of yam of very large dimensions), and _ndoma_ (a vegetable something after the fashion of a turnip, with leaves from three to four feet long and about eighteen inches wide at their widest part). Bananas are the only fruit that I ever came across, but they grow large quantities of sugar-cane, beans of various kinds (from my fondness for which in preference to sweet potatoes I got my native name of Karanjai, or “The eater of beans”) , and another vegetable, which seemed to be a cross between a bean and a pea and which grew on a bush; of grains they have several, of which the principal are maize, _matama_, which is the same as the Indian dhurra and is found all over Africa, _umkanori_, which resembles canary-seed in appearance, and _mawhali_, a somewhat similar seed to the umkanori, from which the fermented gruel known as ujuru is made. The Kikuyu seem to be possessed of a perfect mania for cultivation, their practice being to work a plot of ground until it begins to show signs of exhaustion, when it is allowed to lie fallow or used only for grazing stock for a period of seven years, new ground being broken to take its place in the meanwhile. All the Kikuyu keep stock of some kind, either sheep, cattle, or goats—sometimes all three—which are principally used as currency for the purpose of paying fines and buying wives, the quantity of meat eaten being very small.