196 The British Campaign in the Soudan.

beahs and Cook’s steamers, and is as well known as the Hudson from New York to Albany. Itis navigable at all seasons, but always best at high Nile. Trans-shipment is made at the first cataract, by the aid of a five-mile railway around it, but from August to January, small steamers can be hauled over it.

The second section, from the second cataract to Berber, and above to Metemneh, where Genl. Herbert Stewart struck the Nile again after crossing the Bahiuda desert, has been thoroughly, explored by the eminent civil-engineer Sir John Fowler, who devoted many winters to_ surveying and locating the projected Soudan railroad for Ismail-Pasha. Nothing can be more complete than his report, printed in London, together with his map, accurately marked off in sections of fifty kilometers, and from which the accompanying map is partially compiled.* This section, from the second cataract to Berber, is obstructed by numerous other cataracts, rapids, and shallows, making its navigation very difficult for all but the native craft called nuggars. The difficulty of navigating this great double bend, or S, of the Nile is what forces the Soudan trade away from the river at Berber to seek an outlet at Suakim on the Red Sea. It was sadly demonstrated by the tragic fate of Col. O. H. Stewart, in Sept., 1884. Although the Nile was at its highest, and his steamer had passed safely over the fifth cataract (which, when I saw it at low water, seemed impracticable for any boat), he was wrecked at the fourth cataract, half way between Abou-Hamed and Korti, and was massacred by the Bedouins with his entire party. Nevertheless the * This map was engraved for the Century Magazine, to illustrate my article on the Soudan, in the No. for March, 1885, and its use has been courteously granted to the Am. Geogr. Soc., by the editors of the Century.