Kordofan rains cease. The natives often work the salt that is left behind. The plains are either bare or covered by low bush that is thicker in the wadis. The real bush begins about lat 14? 30' N., where the country becomes more undulating. The rain usually sinks where it falls, there being no visible watershed. This district extends south to the dividing line between northern and southern Kordofan, and in it are most of the gum forests which are the chief wealth of the province.

Along the Nile is a belt of low ground, chiefly black soil, in places 12 miles wide, very fertile, broken by many watercourses and politically attached to the White Nile province. The country rises rapidly westward, becomes much more sandy, and, about 40 miles west of the Nile the rainless and almost treeless district of El Akaba begins, extending westward for 50 miles. This district is uninhabited except during the rains, when the population drive their flocks into it. The hills become higher and steeper to the west, till a level plain is entered near El Obeid, the chief town of Kordofan. To the north of this town is the district of El Kheiran, where the sandhills enclose a number of small basins with fertile soil, and water at depths of 4 to Io feet, once highly cultivated, devastated by the Dervishes, but now rapidly recovering.

Around El Obeid, the soil is much less sandy, the wells are quite numerous, particularly in the town, and there are many villages. Thirty miles west of El Obeid begin the sandy, bush-covered steppes of Dar Hamar, extending to the Darfur frontier, about 170 miles.

Water is the chief topic in northern Kordofan. It is a mistake to regard the country west of Khartum as a waterless district, though there is not enough to support a large sedentary population. In the most of Dar Hamar, however, the people are dependent for water chiefly upon watermelons and the supply they store in the trunks of baobab trees. Melons are grown in enormous quantities and kept in heaps, protected from the sun, until needed. A hole is cut in the hollow trunk of the baobab tree and the cavity is filled with rainwater to be drawn upon as required.

Southern Kordofan is the home of the Baggara or cattle-owning Arabs and Nubas. This is a very different country, consisting of a plain of black soil, from the middle of which the rugged hills of Dar Nuba rise to a height of 3,000 feet. The rain does not sink where it falls, as in the north, but the country is drained by several considerable watercourses, filled during the rains, but dry a few weeks later. The country between the White Nile and Dar Nuba 522