SUDAN DESOLATION not been attended to for several years. We know from Sir Samuel Baker's testimony that the banks of the river between Berber and Khartum about the year 1862 were crowded with populous villages, and that the land was everywhere cultivated, and produced heavy crops, and it was evident that the rule of the Turk, seconded by the atrocities of the Dervishes, had in thirtyfive years turned a flourishing country into a howling wilderness. The frequent gaps in the bank showed where water-wheels had THE DIIURRA AND THE JUiNGLE MEETING AT BAGRAWIYA.

once stood, but these structures had entirely disappeared, and the channels which they once filled must have been choked for years.

About twenty miles up the river we stopped on the west bank to take in wood, and whilst the work was going on I went to the group of tukuls which had recently been put up close to the river, on the site where a thriving village now stands. The men who brought in the wood from the desolate plains were nearly all naked, and must have been starved for months : the few sheep and goats they had were, I believe, better fed, and far better clothed than they. The Sirdar paid for every log of wood taken 261