SKETCHES IN THE SOUDAN 23 



opportunity of witnessing this evening. All the men carry spears, 

 weighted with iron at the butt, knives, and some of them shields, 

 with all the wandering tribes made of buffalo or giraffe hide. 



The river, a wide expanse of white sand, fringed thickly with 

 juniper bushes on the banks, winds a good deal ; now and then we 

 pass an enormous granite rock, cropping up out of the river-bed ; 

 here the whirlpool formed by the river beating against and rush- 

 ing round the boulder during the wet season has made a deep 

 hollow at its base where even now the sand is wet and water 

 within easy reach. This is well known to all animals, who, 

 when no more favourable spot is within reach, will dig and 

 scratch here, and, rewarded, find the wherewithal to quench 

 their thirst. Even now we have just disturbed a flock of guinea- 

 fowls during their morning drink, which, frightened, half flying, 

 half running, seek the shelter of the thick bushes. Monkeys 

 and pigs are often surprised at these spots busily seeking the 

 refreshing draught; butterflies, bees in fact, every animal which 

 walks, flies or creeps assemble here in quest of water, which at 

 this season is scarce and not always within reach of the deeper 

 wells. Here and there the river-bed widens and divides into 

 two or more arms which encircle a sandbank thickly overgrown 

 with deep-green, shiny-leaved nabbuk and laurel-like bushes, 

 with juniper, and the pale, greyish-green eucalyptus plants. 

 These latter are very common, and exude from their every part a 

 thick milky fluid which is highly poisonous. 



How fatiguing and ruffling to one's temper these long marches 

 on a baggage-camel are ! Its jolting motion is very trying to 

 one's spine, which apparently divides into two parts, connected 

 together by a painful hinge in the small of one's back. "When 

 for the moment somewhat more comfortable, having eased the 

 more painful parts, the brute will suddenly stop, curl its head 

 and neck under its stomach to brush and blow the flies away 

 which have settled there ; the jerk nearly sends the rider on 

 to the ground., as everything in front of the saddle has tem- 

 porarily disappeared. Believed of the flies for the moment, a 

 herb in the river-bed tempts his appetite, and he stops with a 

 jerk to pluck it ; or he rushes up to a thorny mimosa bush, of 

 which a camel is particularly fond, brushing one's legs through 

 the branches, and then, when vigorously rebuked, probably as 

 promptly lies down well into the bush, when things become still 



