CHAPTER XXVII ALONG THE AFRICAN COAST THE two chief ports on the African coast of the Red Sea are Port Sudan and Suakim. They were nothing until the completion of the Red Sea road. The original plan was to use Suakim as the ter¬ minus of the Sudan railway. The English surveyors, however, finding a much better harbour at Port Sudan, extended the railroad to that point. The town which was a mere village a few years ago has now several thousand people, and grows like one of the mushroom settlements of the Canadian west.

Going on southward we passed the Italian possessions on the west coast of the Red Sea, where they have a colony known as Eritrea. This colony begins about one hundred and fifty miles south of Suakim and runs down almost to the Strait of Bab-el-Mandeb. It is not wide, extending back from the coast only to where the Abyssinian hills begin. The Italians tried to add to Eritrea a large part of Abyssinia but failed, owing to the resistance of King Menelik. The land they have now is of small value. There are only a few tracts that can be irrigated, and the exports are unimportant. The strip is inhabited by nomads, who raise camels, oxen, sheep, and goats. As the pasturage is scanty, the shepherds have to move about from place to place with their stock. Some of the tribes live in tents. Their wants are simple to an extreme.

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