The Grants get new neighbors when Hereward and Lettice Palmer arrive. He was an officer in the British Indian Army and neither seem prepared for the hardship they must face. Lettice almost goes to pieces when she finds their headman has been badly beaten and lay dying. She tells her husband that that she's not sure she wants to stay. Mr. Roos offers to show Robin's workers how to handle the plow animals but Robin doesn't quite agree with his handling of the local Africans, including Sammy. Elspeth receives a gift of two chameleons which she names George and Mary.