OUTFIT FUNDS. 49 to serve us both in case of peril, I engaged him, notwithstanding he had never travelled beyond Wadi Haifa (the Second Cataract). I judged, however, that I was quite as familiar with the geography of Central Africa as any dragoman I could procure, and that, in any case, I should find it best to form my own plans and choose my own paths. How far I was justified in my choice, will appear in the course of the narrative.

The next step was to procure a double outfit—for the Nile and the Desert—and herein Achmet, who had twice made the journey to Mount Sinai and Petra, rendered me good service.

I had some general knowledge of what was necessary, but without the advantage of his practical experience, should have been very imperfectly prepared. As it was, many things were forgotten in the haste of departure, the need of which I felt when it was too late to procure them. I had been prudent enough, when in Vienna, to provide myself with Berghaus's great map of Arabia and the Yalley of the Nile, which, with a stray volume of Russegger, were my only guides. In Khartoum, afterwards, I stumbled upon a copy of Hoskins's Ethiopia. The greater part of my funds I changed into Egyptian silver medjidsy colonnati, or Spanish pillar-dollars, and the Austrian dollar of Maria Theresa, all of which are current as far as Sennaar and Abyssinia. I also procured five hundred piastres in copper pieces of five pards (about half a cent) each, which were contained in a large palm-basket, and made nearly an ass's load. In addition to these supplies, I obtained from an Armenian merchant a letter of credit on his brother in Khartoum, for two thousand piastres, on which, he gave me to understand, I should be obliged to pay a discount of twenty per cent. I endeavored, but in vain, to procure some information relative to 3