80 THROUGH SOMALILAND AND ABYSSINIA CHAP. 
us that it was very hard being stopped in this way. They did 
not want to touch a hair of any white man’s head, they only 
wanted to wipe out the Boho. However, the elders agreed to 
send back the clan to Eil Sheikh, and themselves to come into 
Bulhaér with M and see what they could do to settle the 
feud. The sappers at last came into sight, and about a dozen 
of the elders accepted our escort to get them safely through 
the Boho lines. I extended my men, a section on either side, 
marching in single file, while M and the elders rode 
bunched together in the space between. We passed the Boho 
line in this order, having first sent the interpreter on to 
explain. The Boho looked savagely at our protégés as we 
passed, but were too sensible to attack us for the sake of slit- 
ting the throats of a few elders, so not a horse was mounted 
and all went off quietly. Arrived in Bulhdr, my friend rode 
out with his interpreter and brought in the Boho elders. After 
two days’ talking the feud was settled for the time being, 
though it broke out again a week later, and gave M an 
immense amount of anxiety and trouble. Twice my little 
party was called out in aid of the civil power, but not having 
to act in self-defence, we were able to keep the peace for a time 
without firing a shot. M ordered the tribes to live apart, 
the Ba-Gadabursi fourteen miles to the west at Eil Sheikh, 
the Boho fifteen miles to the east at Géri, and every few days 
or so he would persuade the elders to meet in Bulhdr for a 
conference. It was only a question of blood-money, but what 
a question! We always knew how things were going, for 
when the relations were strained the two semicircles of old 
men who were seated on the ground would shroud their faces 
in the ends of their tobes, only leaving a slit to look through, 
and they would add the supreme insult of shading their eyes 
with their hands; when things were improving they looked 
their enemies frankly in the face. 
Soon after the cessation of hostilities at Bulhar I was sent 
surveying up the Issutugan river with an escort of fifteen 
sabres of the Aden troop, a body of Indian cavalry permanently 
stationed at Khor Maksar, the outpost near Aden. 
After this trip I returned to Aden to prepare for further 
explorations in the Habr Awal country, and at the end of 
December 1885 I arrived at Bulhdér with three sowars of the 
Aden troop, twelve mounted Panjabis, enlisted in Aden as 
policemen for this special purpose, and ten sepoys of the Bombay 
