230 SAVAGE SUDAN 



accompanying sketch from life. This seemed to shock 

 Baraka's Mohammedan susceptibilities, and the interesting 

 interview terminated all too soon but leaving quite a 

 pleasant memory ! 



To resume the narrative : We were now accompanied 

 by half the villagers ; but these savages, not appreciating 

 the glories of birds'-nesting or of Tomtit-shooting, ever 

 had something bigger (and more eatable) in their minds. 

 They yearned for big-game, yet all they could show 

 me in a long morning's ramble were two 

 bushbuck does (one followed by a fawn). 

 I also saw, far out in waist-deep grass, 

 the horns of a sleeping waterbuck ; so 

 sound was his repose that I actually 

 walked up to within 50 yards. I did 

 this purely for my own amusement, as 

 his was a poor little 24-inch head ; but 

 that again was not understood of the 

 people. 



In an opening among this grass, I 

 shot a snake, 5^ feet long, a mamba. 

 Mahomed Maghazi's terror of snakes 



Mv SHILLUK BELLE. and f a11 that is unseen WaS a recurrent 

 amusement. To do that excellent Sudani 

 justice, I should add that he had "signed on" solely as 

 dragoman, and in taking him into the bush at all, I was 

 taking him entirely outside his proper sphere and into 

 ceaseless alarms. To-day he had implored me not to enter 

 the long grass. "Why, Mahomed?" "Oh, that very 

 bad grass ; no Shilluk go in there ; grass very bad 

 full of lion, leopard, snake!" "But, Mahomed, that's 

 just what we want. You take these natives, go round 

 by those far trees, and drive out a few lions and leopards." 

 Poor Mahomed turned chocolate-green at the prospect. 

 As a matter of fact, one sees very very few snakes in 

 the Sudan. 



One day Mahomed declared he had been attacked 



