192 " CREWE JUNCTION " OF THE NILE bank, shedding white garments as he ran, and rolhng them up, with many verbal instructions, borne down faint on the breeze, to the reis. It was no use ; once free of the shore, making way in the teeth of the wind, the steamer would not stop for the delinquent, and the last visible of poor Sheikh was a lonely white point in the distance, plodding silently on.

At Kodok next day, some time before leaving after the usual short stay of the steamer, 1 went on to the upper deck, and there saw a familiar figure, recumbent in deep sleep. It was Sheikh, who in the twenty-four hours had travelled on foot the whole distance, much of it during the night, and had finished his journey of fifty-five miles by swimming the river.

He had the grace, this good-natured giant, to look rather sheepish and small when I laughed at him, and thenceforth lost no opportunity of atonement for his error, even fishing for a crocodile which I had shot, and had got into waist-deep water, by wading in to search with his legs I The banks grew more and more populous as we progressed, mainly on the west bank ; little groups stood at the meshras (landing-places), men strode along the banks, and black nippers tended herds of slowly grazing cattle. Here and there on the edge of far-distant bush could be seen the forms of shy antelope, and conical hut roofs dotted the skyhne.

On either side of the steamer we were accom-