200 THE TROOPS.

tims to the climate, or perished after a few years' service in the razzias or slave-hunts. The entire garrison consists of blacks : it is, in fact, indispensably necessary that it should be so ; for the white men cannot accommodate themselves to the climate. Among all Mehemed All's troops, numbers of which I have seen in various parts of his dominions, I never met with a regiment so wretchedly equipped, so badly drilled, and so utterly deficient in discipline as the one in question. The soldiers wear only a white cotton uniform, and it would be injudicious indeed to clad them in cloth in this hot climate ; but when we come to consider that the negroes, by nature not over addicted to cleanliness, do not trouble themselves with washing, and are not even provided for this purpose with soap, an expense they feel no inclination to defray from their own purses, and add to this that they are in the habit of anointing their bodies frequently with butter as a means for preserving their health, a pretty correct idea of a trooper of Kordofan may be formed. On meeting one of these foot-soldiers without his accoutrements a stranger is really at a loss how to classify him, and before he has thoroughly accustomed himself to the sight he would rather take him for a scarecrow than a soldier.* The accou-* The chaiissure consists of shoes and sandals, but a part of them appear on parade barefooted, for they are not over rigid disciplinarians ;the covering to the head, like that of all the other troops, is the turboosh—a red cap, and the only article of dress about them in decent preservation.