498 A DARKNESS THAT MIGHT BE FELT [chap. xix. 
this time we were subjected to intense heat and con¬ 
stant dust-storms, attended with a general plague of 
boils. Verily, the plagues of Egypt remain to this day 
in the Soudan. On the 26 th June, we had the most 
extraordinary dust-storm that had ever been seen by 
the inhabitants. I was sitting in the court-yard of my 
agent's house at about 4.30 p.m. : there was no wind, 
and the sun was as bright as usual in this cloudless 
sky, when suddenly a gloom was cast over all,—a dull 
yellow glare pervaded the atmosphere. Knowing that 
this effect portended a dust-storm, and that the present 
calm would be followed by a hurricane of wind, I rose 
to go home, intending to secure the shutters. Hardly 
had I risen, when I saw approaching, from the S.W. 
apparently, a solid range of immense brown mountains, 
high in air. So rapid was the passage of this extra¬ 
ordinary phenomenon, that in a few minutes we were 
in actual pitchy darkness. At first there was no wind, 
and the peculiar calm gave an oppressive character to 
the event. We were in “ a darkness that might be 
felt." Suddenly the wind arrived, but not with the 
violence that I had expected. There were two persons 
with me, Michael Latfalla, my agent, and Monsieur 
Lombrosio. So intense was the darkness, that we tried 
to distinguish our hands placed close before our eyes ;— 
not even an. outline could be seen. This lasted for 
upwards of twenty minutes : it then rapidly passed 
away, and the sun shone as before ; but we had felt the 
darkness that Moses had inflicted upon the Egyptians. 
The Egyptian Government had, it appeared, been 
pressed by some of the European Powers to take 
measures for the suppression of the slave-trade: a 
steamer had accordingly been ordered to capture all 
vessels laden with this infamous cargo. Two vessels 
had been seized and brought to Khartoum, containing 
850 human beings!—packed together like anchovies, 
the living and the dying festering together, and the 
dead lying beneath them. European eye-witnesses 
assured me that the disembarking of this frightful 
