GOOD NEWS. 471 



of Sobat to me, partly to prevent the constant incursions of 

 the Fashoda men into my territory, and partly to establish a 

 regular post to Khartum. The steamer would have brought 

 the letters as far as Bor ; from there I should have pushed 

 forward three stations to the north, one of which was to have 

 been situated on the lower part of the Bahr-el-Zaraf, where it 

 is navigable all the year, and Sobat would have been the ter- 

 minus. Thus the post — provided Fashoda still existed — 

 would have arrived at Khartum in about thirty days, whether 

 the river were closed or open, and we should have had the 

 additional advantage that all necessaries could reach us through 

 these stations, whenever there were obstructions in the river. 

 Sobat was granted me, the steamer was promised — and in the 

 end we were left in the lurch. 



Good news seldom comes alone, and so it has happened 

 this time. I heard next that Kumbek had been successfully 

 evacuated, and that the soldiers and baggage had arrived in 

 Ayak, whence the retreat on Amadi is to be commenced. 

 This station is to be a centre for the defence, but it has lately 

 been greatly endangered, for a number of rebellious Danagla 

 assembled in the little station of Sayadin, and a Sudanese 

 officer, who went against them with some soldiers, was stupid 

 enough to fight and lose a quantity of war material. My 

 Keremallah mission also is in Sayadin, it seems ; it only went 

 as far as Bolko, and then returned ; now it is in a dilemma. 

 As soon as the soldiers from Ayak arrive at Amadi, and have 

 joined those now there, who amount to about a hundred and 

 fifty, a vigorous attack is to take place. Of still greater im- 

 portance to us all is the news from Makraka, that the rebels 

 assembled in Kudurma — they had regularly entrenched them- 

 selves — have retired and taken the route to Sabi through 

 Gosa, where there is said to have been a sanguinary collision 

 between them and Abdullahi Wod Abd-es-Samat's men. The 

 reports of this event are so confused that we shall do well to 

 wait for further details. The greatest anarchy seems to have 

 prevailed in the Bahr-el-Ghazal province ever since the retire- 

 ment of poor Lupton Bey. 



