THE EGYPTIAN SUDAN in the river were covered with bright green vegetation, shrubs, and trees, and a few natives had already returned and were cultivating the ground. The men I saw wore loin-cloths only, and the women very little more ; how and on what they lived it was hard to imagine. The east bank is usually from eight to CLEAkING AT A WOODING STATION ON THE WEST BANK.

twelve feet high, and its soil is extremely good, but when I saw it the ground was wholly covered with a dense mass of thorny bushes of all kinds, and a thick matted crop of halfa grass, which must have been in undisturbed possession of the land for many years. The palm trees were in a decaying state, and a Turkish merchant on the steamer, who had lived in the country for many years, and had witnessed the fall of Khartum, told me that the mass of withered leaves at their tops showed they had 260 I