232 EGYPT AND THE SOUDAN.

trotting camel must carry nothing but its rider and a day's food. To the fact that three tins of bully beef and a spare suit of underclothing had been intrusted to him in addition, the cruide attributed the collapse of his animal. But, once having started, nothing should ever stop you on a journey in eastern climes. Consent to even a day's delay, and you may be unable to advance again for a week. So, sternly refusing to halt while he endeavoured to procure another camel, the traveller proceeded with one guide, leaving behind the other, and trusting to replace the stores he carried with eggs and chickens from the wayside villages. Every morning they breakfasted as they jogged on their camels' backs over the sand, half a dozen eo-os each and some dates formincr their repast; but he explains that a Nubian egg is a very different article from that deposited by an English hen. " An average wood pigeon, if fed well for a week and put on her mettle, would probably surpass in the size of her produce the best egg-laying bird in the Soudan."

The journey was from Dongola to Haffir, six hours, about thirty miles, with a good road and frequent villages; Haffir to Fakr Bender thirty miles; thence across the Mahass desert to Koke, where the river is crossed in native nuorars which the camels seem to understand. Koke to Dal, where there was a large commissariat station and rations were issued. Thence to Sarras, with twenty-eight miles' journey across the desert and over rocky ground.

During this journey the correspondent was much struck with the ignorance of the people as to the objects which the English had in view in entering their country. At Dongola itself the inhabitants considered that the troops had been sent to assist the mudir in reconquering the Soudan; but elsewhere the people thought they had come to annex their country, as they believed they had already done Lower Egypt. In Lower Egypt itself the wildest stories were circulated and believed in the villages; and although Englishmen individually, of all the foreigners who mix among the people, were most popular with them, our interference with their government was strongly disapproved of. They be-