HIPPOPOTAMUS 
195 
along the taffrail so as to cover this second hippo . . . 
suddenly the telescope - sight detached itself, toppled 
sidelong, and with sullen plunge disappeared in the 
depths of Nile! This spelt sheer catastrophe, for I only 
possessed one of these instruments and its loss signified 
to me nothing less than atrophy —the virtual annihila¬ 
tion of all the plans and ambitions of my expedition. 
That fact I realised at once, and instantly turned to take 
exact bearings. On the bank directly inshore grew an 
ambatch with a single yellow blossom, and I reckoned that 
the lost telescope lay 18 yards straight outside that 
flower. At once we anchored and I proceeded to my mark 
in the dinghy. Everything now depended on the depth 
of water. That, by signal good-luck, proved to be just 
5 feet—-“chin-deep”—and soon I had three of the crew 
hanging on to the gunwale while they explored the river¬ 
bed with their feet. The bottom proved to be firm soil 
overgrown by a creeping water-plant. Hope arose. Then, 
at that critical moment, came a shout from the gyassa 
—anchored 40 yards away — “ Timsah /” ( = crocodile). 
There was a swirl on the surface, and within brief 
seconds the three “boys” had scrambled aboard. Hope 
fell to zero. As a desperate resource I now fired three or 
four rifle-shots vertically into the river ; the vast columns 
of water flung up 20 feet high by the impact of bullets 
striking at a velocity of half a mile per second—together 
with a hint of backsheesh (the first and only time I ever 
uttered that hateful word in the Sudan)—turned the scale. 
The sheer amazement of the men on thus visualising 
the power of cordite, dissolved fear and reanimated them 
to fresh efforts. A minute later one of the three black 
heads plunged beneath the surface, the corresponding 
hands disappearing from the gunwale. The next I saw 
of them —ere the head showed above water-—those 
uplifted hands grasped the sunken telescope! Truly it 
was a marvellous recovery? I did those “boys” well 
that night—and well they deserved it. 
