288 EXTRACTS FROM 



It was therefore all over with the perfect quiet which the 

 hysena demands, so instead of uselessly waiting, I went home, 

 meeting on the way the dragoman Paulovich, who had unfor- 

 tunately gone out to shoot with Baron Seckendorf at the very 

 place where I had been watching. Hoyos at his post near the 

 town had killed one jackal and wounded another, and the 

 Grand Duke and Eschenbacher were at one time actually sur- 

 rounded by howling jackals, but could not get a shot owing 

 to the unfavourable nature of the ground. On my way back 

 at midnight I had a beautiful view of the picturesque town of 

 Assuan, the river, and the fairy-like island of Elephantine, 

 all steeped in a magic flood of the purest moonlight. 



At seven o'clock on the morning of the 9th the steamer left 

 Assuan, that charming place, so thoroughly African and so 

 full of ethnographical interest. We glided down-stream at 

 great speed through the now familiar districts, and the hours 

 we spent on deck passed quickly, for the return journey 

 afforded the desired opportunity of arranging the many notes 

 we had collected, and of jotting down the various reminiscences 

 of our travels. 



We were sitting in the cabin about the middle of the day 

 when the steamer came to a sudden and violent stop, and we 

 could distinctly feel the heavy vessel boring into the mud. 

 While going up-stream she had frequently run aground, a 

 thing which happens to every Nile steamer, owing to the con- 

 tinual shifting of the sandbanks, but the rapidity of our down- 

 ward course had now driven us in more firmly than ever, and 

 as the old Admiral declared that it would take at least two 

 hours to get the vessel afloat again, we immediately had our- 

 selves rowed ashore. 



We were at a point called Kom-el-Emir, where high, steep, 

 rocky mountains closely approach the stream, forming a short 

 but beautiful gorge, succeeded by a well-cultivated plain. 



Our party now separated to shoot in various directions. I 



