500 LETTERS ‘TO DR SCHW EINFURLE, The situation in this country is still a very gloomy one. As I said before, the greater part of our people do not wish to retire from here. J expect a definite answer from Lado by the middle of this month, and shall then be able to consider how I am to act. If I can only get the people to let the HKeyptians retire, 1 am quite ready to remain myself.

April 20, 1886.

The steamer I expected has arrived, but has brought only unwelcome news. I have no information from the officers whom I sent to Lado to explain the situation to the men there. But a private letter from an Hgyptian official has reached me, containing, among other things, the following :—“ The report that several officers are on their way here to make preparations for a movement to the south has caused great excitement, and the men have agreed among themselves not to go south, for, they say, the way to the seat of our Government does not run southwards, but through Ladd to Khartum, and they would rather return to their homes than vo to the south. But if they are forced to do so, they will seize all the arms and ammunition, kill any one who tries to stop them, and finally make their way homewards. All the men from here to Wadelai are unanimous, and should you still insist on the march to the south, I fear that not one of us will escape, neither you nor we. I beg you therefore to give up this plan, and instead to send boats to Khartum to procure help from there. No one believes the news which comes from the south, but the men say, ‘We had better remain here than let ourselves be sold to Kabréga;’ and, had not the Major, Rihan Aga, held them in check, they might have rushed off to the south long ago, carried out their designs there, and then have gone to their homes through Wadelai.” To explain this, I must tell you that about a month ago all the older corporals, &c., in Lado, almost all of them men from Bornu, Adamawa, &c., conspired to kill all the officers, Sudanese, and others in the place, and establish a sort of free state. But an Egyptian officer heard of the plot, and informed his superiors of it, and the Major put the ringleaders in irons, releasing them,