During these same excursions I learnt more about a number of the recreations in which the Freelanders specially indulge. With David I visited the numerous points on the Kenia and the Aberdare mountains from which one obtains the most charming views. To these points every Sunday the young people resort for singing and dancing, and as a rule they are treated to some surprise which the Recreation Committee--a standing institution in every Freeland town--has organised in celebration of some event or other. To me the most surprising was the Ice-Festival on the great skating-pool on the Kenia glacier. Five years before, the united Recreation Committees of Eden Vale, Dana City, and Upper Lykipia had converted a plateau nearly 14,000 feet above the sea, and covering 5,900 acres, into a pool fed by water from the adjoining large icefield. From the end of May until the middle of August there are always at this elevation severe night frosts, which quickly convert the glacier-water of the pool, already near the freezing-point, into a solid floor of ice. After surrounding this magnificent skating-place with luxurious warmable waiting, dressing, and refreshment rooms, and connecting it with the foot of the mountain by means of an inclined railway, the united committees handed over their work to the public for gratuitous use. The large expense of construction was easily defrayed by voluntary contributions, and the cost of maintenance was more than covered by the donations of the numerous visitors. During the whole of the cool season the large ice-pool is covered by skaters, very many of whom are women, not merely from the Kenia district--that is, from a radius of sixty or seventy miles--but also from all parts of Freeland. Even from the shores of the Indian Ocean and of the great lakes men and women who are fond of this healthy amusement come to participate in the brilliant ice-festivals. There is at present a project on foot to build at the skating-place a magnificent hotel, which shall enable the lovers of this graceful and invigorating exercise to spend the night at an elevation of nearly 14,000 feet above the sea. Moreover, the great popularity of the Kenia ice-pool has given occasion to another similar undertaking, which is nearly completed on the Kilimanjaro, at a level 1,640 feet higher than the ice-pool of the Kenia. Another projected ice-pool on the Mountains of the Moon, near the Albert Nyanza, has not yet been begun, as the local committee have not yet found a site sufficiently high and large.