76 SERVICE AND SPORT IN THE SUDAN 



the receipt of the order, for the mail boat. It was a 

 good bit late, so it did not stop en route to let the 

 passengers have a passing stalk. Even before I left 

 the Sudan people were beginning to look shocked at 

 the idea of stopping the mail boat for that purpose, 

 and just after my arrival there stopping a train to 

 alight to shoot gazelle became a thing of the past. 

 The development of a country may bring compensa- 

 tions. It also has its drawbacks. 



Game there was in plenty. We saw all sorts, includ- 

 ing buffalo. Once we passed a fine lion, who, as we 

 approached, yawned ostentatiously, performed part of 

 his toilet, and moved slowly into the bush. The boat 

 had naturally made straight for the bank, but when 

 the lion disappeared we saw that, without a long 

 delay, we could not hope to bag him. 



Fashoda, now called Kodok, in deference to the 

 feelings of the French, needs no description. Its 

 antique guns on rickety carriages, the remains of 

 Marchand's fort, and so on, have found many his- 

 torians, as has the open house, reminding one 

 of mediaeval times, kept by the then governor. 



At Dul I made the acquaintance of the priests of 

 the Catholic Mission. They never failed to give me 

 a grand present of fresh vegetables the many times 

 I called on them after this. Their Father Superior, 

 the greatest, if not the only, authority on the Shilluk 

 tribe, showed me the native method of spearing 

 fish, at which he was himself an adept. The dug- 

 out canoe is pushed into the half-submerged grasses 

 at the edge of the river, the fisherman poises his spear. 



