6 SERVICE AND SPORT IN THE SUDAN 



Egyptian Army but a short time, and so knew very 

 little Arabic. Our camel men wished to take advantage 

 of this in order to take a month for the journey. Very 

 fortunately, Colonel Friend, R.E., had given me an 

 itinerary showing that the 210 miles should be done in 

 ten days. Ye gods ! how ludicrous I would consider 

 a proposal to travel at even so slow a rate with my 

 present experience, unless weak camels or some other 

 potent reason were the cause. Then, too, at the 

 various resting-places there were disputes about water- 

 ing the camels. At one village, where the wells were 

 200 feet deep, our animals lay beside them the whole 

 day. At last I seized my phrase book, and, learning 

 the Arabic for " the camels must be watered," pro- 

 ceeded to see it done. In a minute all around were 

 cheerfully helping me, and in half-an-hour we were 

 able to go on. 



We had, too, a capital map compiled from sketches 

 by Captain Lloyd (Cameronians), which was very 

 useful, though we travelled almost entirely by night, 

 marvelling much at the wonderful sense of direction 

 the Arab possesses. It is a gift that soon comes to 

 one when one has a lot of night travelling to do. 

 Near Jebel Tius, the only hill of importance that we 

 passed, and it only a couple of hundred feet high, 

 we chased the shadow of a creeper-covered thorn-bush 

 for the best part of the day, as our baggage had lagged 

 behind. I remember being much amused, as on this 

 spot on the map was written the legend " No shade," 

 and it turned out to be almost the only place with any 

 pretence of it between Omdurman and Bara. One 



