BEYOND THE SUDD 
295 
Hell’s Gate. Here the narrowed Nile surges through a 
rock-girt gorge at a speed of eight knots—double its 
normal velocity. The river, moreover, immediately above 
the neck of the gorge sweeps round in a right-angle bend, 
thus doubling or trebling the danger of the transit. 
On the upward voyage we had forced the passage 
without an ounce of power left to spare. Coming down, 
we essayed to “rush it,” the steamer’s own io-knot 
speed accelerated in the above ratio. In the neck of the 
narrows she struck an unseen rock forward, and, pivoted 
on this, instantly swung round to starboard. I could 
see that her bows—pointing westward'—would clear ; but 
the stern ? ... it appeared absolutely inevitable that that 
must crash into the piled rocks that there projected 
far into the stream, and around which the pent-up current 
raged and foamed in the style of a Norwegian salmon- 
river. All hands hung on tight and tense as the ship 
swung round, full broadside across stream, towards the 
danger-point. > Luckily the towering top-hamper of these 
Nile three-deckers had deceived eye-judgment, and the 
crucial right-angle passed without the expected shock. 
The length of the Omdurman is 130 feet: the breadth 
of Hell’s Gate must be a foot or two more—it was a 
matter of inches. 
We had an almost equally perilous passage downwards 
in March 1919, only getting through stern-first and at 
the third attempt, and that solely owing to the cool and 
skilful handling of our Arab navigators. 
Novel and picturesque as are these rock-girt rapids 
with the swirling stream between, yet the persuasive 
power of dynamite may here be profitably employed so 
soon as the Sudan has a few £ (E. or otherwise), to 
spare. 
(vi) Homeward-Bound 
Hardly had we bade farewell—a last farewell—to 
Governor Stigand, and remote Mongalla had sunk from 
