THE TURNING POINT. 843 As we weighed anchor, I found that the men had taken down both sails and shipped the oars for our return to Khartoum. We had reached the southern point of the island, in about lat. 12° 20/ north, and the north-wind was still blowing strongly. The rounded tops of the mimosa forests bent southward as they tossed ; the flowery arms of the ambak-trees waved to the south, trailing against the current, and my heart sank within me at the thought of retracing my steps. We had sailed two hundred and fifty miles in forty-eight hours ; the gateway to the unknown South was open, and it seemed a treason against Fortune to turn my face towards the Mediterranean. "Achmet!" said I, "tell the men to set the trinkeet again. We will sail to the Bahr el-Grkazal." The Theban's face became ghastly at the bare idea. " 0 Master !" he exclaimed, " are you not satisfied with your good fortune ? We are now nearly at the end of the earth, and if we go further, it will be impossible to return." Rai's Abou-Hammed declared that he had kept his word, and that he should now return, as it had been agreed, before we left Khartoum. I knew there was certain danger in going further, and that I had no right to violate my agreement and peril others as well as myself; but there lay the great river, holding in his lap, to tempt me on, isles of brighter bloom and spreading out shores of yet richer foliage. I was in the centre of the Continent. Beyond me all was strange and unknown, and the Grulf of Guinea was less distant than the Mediterranean, which I left not three months before. Why not push on and attempt to grasp the Central African secret ? The fact that stronger, braver and bolder men had failed, was one lure the more. Happily for me, perhaps, my object on commencing the voyage had been rest and