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I had killed several wild geese for breakfast in the absence of
the hippopotami, when I suddenly heard the peculiar loud snorting
neigh of these animals in my rear; we had passed them
unperceived, as they had been beneath the surface. After a quick
walk of about half a mile, during which time the cry of the
hippos had been several times repeated, I observed six of these
curious animals standing in the water about shoulder-deep. There
was no cover, therefore I could only advance upon the sand
without a chance of stalking them; this caused them to retreat to
deeper water, but upon my arrival within about eighty yards, they
raised their heads well up, and snorted an impudent challenge. I
had my old Ceylon No. 10 double rifle, and, taking a steady aim
at the temple of one that appeared to be the largest, the ball
cracked loudly upon the skull. Never had there been such a
commotion in the pool as now! At the report of the rifle, five
heads sank and disappeared like stones, but the sixth hippo
leaped half out of the water, and, falling backwards, commenced
a series of violent struggles: now upon his back; then upon one
side, with all four legs frantically paddling, and raising a
cloud of spray and foam; then waltzing round and round with its
huge jaws wide open, raising a swell in the hitherto calm surface
of the water. A quick shot with the left-hand barrel produced no
effect, as the movements of the animal were too rapid to allow a
steady aim at the forehead; I accordingly took my trmisty little
Fletcher* double rifle No. 24, and, running knee-deep into the
water to obtain a close shot, I fired exactly between the eyes,
near the crown of the head. At the report of the little Fletcher
the hippo disappeared; the tiny waves raised by the commotion
broke upon the sand, but the game was gone.

* This excellent and handy rifle was made by Thomas Fletcher,
of Gloucester, and accompanied me like a faithful dog
throughout my journey of nearly five years to the Albert
N'yanza, and returned with me to England as good as new.

This being my first vis-a-vis with a hippo, I was not certain
whether I could claim the victory; he was gone, but where?
However, while I was speculating upon the case, I heard a
tremendous rush of water, and I saw five hippopotami tearing
along in full trot through a portion of the pool that was not
deep enough to cover them above the shoulder: this was the affair
of about half a minute, as they quickly reached deep water, and
disappeared at about a hundred and fifty yards' distance.

The fact of five hippos in retreat after I had counted six in the
onset was conclusive that my waltzing friend was either dead or
disabled; I accordingly lost no time in following the direction
of the herd. Hardly had I arrived at the spot where they had
disappeared, when first one and then another head popped up and
again sank, until one more hardy than the rest ventured to appear
within fifty yards, and to bellow as before. Once more the No. 10
crashed through his head, and again the waltzing and struggling
commenced like the paddling of a steamer: this time, however, the
stunned hippo in its convulsive efforts came so close to the
shore that I killed it directly in shallow water, by a forehead
shot with the little Fletcher. I concluded from this result that
my first hippo must also be lying dead in deep water.

The Arabs, having heard the shots fired, had begun to gather
towards the spot, and, upon my men shouting that a hippo was
killed, crowds came running to the place with their knives and
ropes, while others returned to their encampment to fetch camels
and mat bags to convey the flesh. In half an hour at least three
hundred Arabs were on the spot; the hippo had been hauled to
shore by ropes, and, by the united efforts of the crowd, the
heavy carcase had been rolled to the edge of the water. Here the
attack commenced; no pack of hungry hyaenas could have been more
savage. I gave them permission to take the flesh, and in an
instant a hundred knives were at work: they fought over the spoil
like wolves. No sooner was the carcase flayed than the struggle
commenced for the meat; the people were a mass of blood, as some
stood thigh-deep in the reeking intestines wrestling for the fat,
while many hacked at each other's hands for coveted portions that
were striven for as a bonne bouche. I left the savage crowd in
their ferocious enjoyment of flesh and blood, and I returned to
camp for breakfast, my Turk, Hadji Achmet, carrying some
hippopotamus steaks.

That morning my wife and I breakfasted upon our first hippo, an
animal that was destined to be our general food throughout our
journey among the Abyssinian tributaries of the Nile. After
breakfast we strolled down to the pool to search for the
hippopotamus No. 1. This we at once found, dead, as it had risen
to the surface, and was floating like the back of a turtle a few
inches above the water. The Arabs had been so intent upon the
division of their spoil that they had not observed their new
prize; accordingly, upon the signal being given, a general rush
took place, and in half an hour a similar scene was enacted to
that of hippo No. 2.

The entire Arab camp was in commotion and full of joy at this
unlooked-for arrival of flesh. Camels laden with meat and hide
toiled along the sandy bed of the river; the women raised their
long and shrill cry of delight; and we were looked upon as
general benefactors for having brought them a supply of good food
in this season of distress. In the afternoon I arranged my
tackle, and strolled down to the pool to fish. There was a
difficulty in procuring bait; a worm was never heard of in the
burning deserts of Nubia, neither had I a net to catch small
fish; I was therefore obliged to bait with pieces of
hippopotamnus. Fishing in such a pool as that of the Atbara was
sufficiently exciting, as it was impossible to speculate upon
what creature might accept the invitation; but the Arabs who
accompanied me were particular in guarding me against the
position I had taken under a willow-bush close to the water, as
they explained, that most probably a crocodile would take me
instead of the bait; they declared that accidents had frequently
happened when people had sat upon the bank either to drink with
their hands, or even while watching their goats. I accordingly
fished at a few feet distant from the margin, and presently I had
a bite; I landed a species of perch about two pounds' weight;
this was the "boulti," one of the best Nile fish mentioned by the
traveller Bruce. In a short time I had caught a respectable dish
of fish, but hitherto no monster had paid me the slightest
attention; accordingly I changed my bait, and upon a powerful
hook, fitted upon treble-twisted wire, I fastened an enticing
strip of a boulti. The bait was about four ounces, and glistened
like silver; the water was tolerably clear, but not too bright,
and with such an attraction I expected something heavy. My float
was a large-sized pike-float for live bait, and this civilized
sign had been only a few minutes in the wild waters of the
Atbara, when, bob! and away it went! I had a very large reel,
with nearly three hundred yards of line that had been specially
made for monsters; down went the top of my rod, as though a
grindstone was suspended on it, and, as I recovered its position,
away went the line, and the reel revolved, not with the sudden
dash of a spirited fish, but with the steady determined pull of
a trotting horse. What on earth have I got hold of? In a few
minutes about a hundred yards of line were out, and as the
creature was steadily but slowly travelling down the centre of
the channel, I determined to cry "halt!" if possible, as my
tackle was extremely strong, and my rod was a single bamboo.
Accordingly, I put on a powerful strain, which was replied to by
a sullen tug, a shake, and again my rod was pulled suddenly down
to the water's edge. At length, after the roughest handling, I
began to reel in slack line, as my unknown friend had doubled in
upon me; and upon once more putting severe pressure upon him or
her, as it might be, I perceived a great swirl in the water,
about twenty yards from the rod. The tackle would bear anything,
and I strained so heavily upon my adversary, that I soon reduced
our distance; but the water was exceedingly deep, the bank
precipitous, and he was still invisible. At length, after much
tugging and counter-tugging, he began to show; eagerly I gazed
into the water to examine my new acquaintance, when I made out
something below, in shape between a coach-wheel and a
sponging-bath; in a few moments more I brought to the surface an
enormous turtle, well hooked. I felt like the old lady who won an
elephant in a lottery: that I had him was certain, but what was
I to do with my prize? It was at the least a hundred pounds'
weight, and the bank was steep and covered with bushes; thus it
was impossible to land the monster, that now tugged and dived
with the determination of the grindstone that his first pull had
suggested. Once I attempted the gaff but the trusty weapon that
had landed many a fish in Scotland broke in the hard shell of the
turtle, and I was helpless. My Arab now came to my assistance,
and at once terminated the struggle. Seizing the line with both
hands, utterly regardless of all remonstrance (which, being in
English, he did not understand), he quickly hauled our turtle to
the surface, and held it, struggling and gnashing its jaws, close
to the steep bank. In a few moments the line slackened, and the
turtle disappeared. The fight was over! The sharp horny jaws had
bitten through treble-twisted brass wire as clean as though cut
by shears. My visions of turtle soup had faded.

The heavy fish were not in the humour to take; I therefore shot
one with a rifle as it came to the surface to blow, and, the
water in this spot being shallow, we brought it to shore; it was
a species of carp, between thirty and forty pounds; the scales
were rather larger than a crown piece, and so hard that they
would have been difficult to pierce with a harpoon. It proved to
be useless for the table, being of an oily nature that was only
acceptable to the Arabs.

In the evening I went out stalking in the desert, and returned
with five fine buck gazelles. These beautiful creatures so
exactly resemble the colour of the sandy deserts which they
inhabit, that they are most difficult to distinguish, and their
extreme shyness renders stalking upon foot very uncertain. I
accordingly employed an Arab to lead a camel, under cover of
which I could generally manage to approach within a hundred
yards. A buck gazelle weighs from sixty to seventy pounds, and is
the perfection of muscular development. No person who has seen
the gazelles in confinement in a temperate climate can form an
idea of the beauty of the animal in its native desert. Born in
the scorching sun, nursed on the burning sand of the treeless and
shadowless wilderness, the gazelle is among the antelope tribe as
the Arab horse is among its brethren, the high-bred and
superlative beauty of the race. The skin is as sleek as satin, of
a colour difficult to describe, as it varies between the lightest
mauve and yellowish brown; the belly is snow-white; the legs,
from the knee downwards, are also white, and are as fine as
though carved from ivory; the hoof is beautifully shaped, and
tapers to a sharp point; the head of the buck is ornamented by
gracefully-curved annulated horns, perfectly black, and generally
from nine to twelve inches long in the bend; the eye is the
well-known perfection--the full, large, soft, and jet-black eye
of the gazelle. Although the desert appears incapable of
supporting animmial life, there are in the undulating surface
numerous shallow sandy ravines, in which are tufts of a herbage
so coarse that, as a source of nourishment, it would be valueless
to a domestic animal: nevertheless, upon this dry and wiry
substance the delicate gazelles subsist; and, although they never
fatten, they are exceedingly fleshy and in excellent condition.
Entirely free from fat, and nevertheless a mass of muscle and
sinew, the gazelle is the fastest of the antelope tribe. Proud of
its strength, and confident in its agility, it will generally
bound perpendicularly four or five feet from the ground several
times before it starts at full speed, as though to test the
quality of its sinews before the race. The Arabs course them with
greyhounds, and sometimes they are caught by running several dogs
at the same time; but this result is from the folly of the
gazelle, who at first distances his pursuers like the wind; but,
secure in its speed, it halts and faces the dogs, exhausting
itself by bounding exultingly in the air; in the meantime the
greyhounds are closing up, and diminishing the chance of escape.
As a rule, notwithstanding this absurdity of the gazelle, it has
the best of the race, and the greyhounds return crestfallen and
beaten. Altogether it is the most beautiful specimen of game that
exists, far too lovely and harmless to be hunted and killed for
the mere love of sport. But when dinner depends upon the rifle,
beauty is no protection; accordingly, throughout our desert march
we lived upon gazelles, and I am sorry to confess that I became
very expert at stalking these wary little animals. The flesh,
although tolerably good, has a slight flavour of musk; this is
not peculiar to the gazelle, as the odour is common to most of
the small varieties of antelopes.

Having a good supply of meat, all hands were busily engaged in
cutting it into strips and drying it for future use; the bushes
were covered with festoons of flesh of gazelles and hippopotami,
and the skins of the former were prepared for making girbas, or
water-sacks. The flaying process for this purpose is a delicate
operation, as the knife must be so dexterously used that no false
cut should injure the hide. The animal is hung up by the hind
legs; an incision is then made along the inside of both thighs to
the tail, and with some trouble the skin is drawn off the body
towards the head, precisely as a stocking might be drawn from the
leg; by this operation the skin forms a seamless bag, open at
both ends. To form a girba, the skin must be buried in the earth
for about twenty hours: it is then washed in water, and the hair
is easily detached. Thus rendered clean, it is tanned by soaking
for several days in a mixture of the bark of a mimosa and water;
from this it is daily withdrawn, and stretched out with pegs upon
the ground; it is then well scrubbed with a rough stone, and
fresh mimosa bark well bruised, with water, is rubbed in by the
friction. About four days are sufficient to tan the thin skin of
a gazelle, which is much valued for its toughness and durability;
the aperture at the hind quarters is sewn together, and the
opening of the neck is closed, when required, by tying. A good
water-skin should be porous, to allow the water to exude
sufficiently to moisten the exterior: thus the action of the air
upon the exposed surface causes evaporation, and imparts to the
water within the skin a delicious coolness. The Arabs usually
prepare their tanned skins with an empyreumatical oil made from
a variety of substances, the best of which is that from the
sesame grain; this has a powerful smell, and renders the water so
disagreeable that few Europeans could drink it. This oil is
black, and much resembles tar in appearance; it has the effect of
preserving the leather, and of rendering it perfectly
water-tight. In desert travelling each person should have his own
private water-skin slung upon his dromedary; for this purpose
none are so good as a small-sized gazelle skin that will contain
about two gallons.

On the 23d June we were nearly suffocated by a whirlwind that
buried everything within the tents several inches in dust; the
heat was intense; as usual the sky was spotless, but the simoom
was more overpowering than I had yet experienced. I accordingly
took my rifle and went down to the pool, as any movement, even in
the burning sun, was preferable to inaction in that sultry heat
and dust. The crocodiles had dragged the skeletons of the
hippopotami into the water; several huge heads appeared and then
vanished from the surface, and the ribs of the carcase that
projected, trembled and jerked as the jaws of the crocodiles were
at work beneath. I shot one of very large size through the head,
but it sank to the bottom; I expected to find it on the following
morning floating upon the surface when the gas should have
distended the body.

I also shot a large single bull hippopotamus late in the evening,
which was alone at the extremity of the pool; he sank at the
forehead shot, and, as he never rose again, I concluded that he
was dead, and that I should find him on the morrow with the
crocodile. Tired with the heat, I trudged homeward over the hot
and fatiguing sand of the river's bed.

The cool night arrived, and at about half-past eight I was lying
half asleep upon my bed by the margin of the river, when I
fancied that I heard a rumbling like distant thunder: I had not
heard such a sound for months, but a low uninterrupted roll
appeared to increase in volume, although far distant. Hardly had
I raised my head to listen more attentively when a confusion of
voices arose from the Arabs' camp, with a sound of many feet, and
in a few minutes they rushed into my camp, shouting to my men in
the darkness, "El Bahr! El Bahr!" (the river! the river!)

We were up in an instant, and my interpreter, Mahomet, in a state
of intense confusion, explained that the river was coming down,
and that the supposed distant thunder was the roar of approaching
water.

Many of the people were asleep on the clean sand on the river's
bed; these were quickly awakened by the Arabs, who rushed down
the steep bank to save the skulls of my two hippopotami that were
exposed to dry. Hardly had they descended, when the sound of the
river in the darkness beneath told us that the water had arrived,
and the men, dripping with wet, had just sufficient time to drag
their heavy burdens up the bank.

All was darkness and confusion; everybody was talking and no one
listening; but the great event had occurred the river had arrived
"like a thief in the night." On the morning of the 24th June, I
stood on the banks of the noble Atbara river, at the break of
day. The wonder of the desert!--yesterday there was a barren
sheet of glaring sand, with a fringe of withered bush and trees
upon its borders, that cut the yellow expanse of desert. For days
we had journeyed along the exhausted bed: all Nature, even in
Nature's poverty, was most poor: no bush could boast a leaf: no
tree could throw a shade: crisp gums crackled upon the stems of
the mimosas, the sap dried upon the burst bark, sprung with the
withering heat of the simoom. In one night there was a mysterious
change--wonders of the mighty Nile!--an army of water was
hastening to the wasted river: there was no drop of rain, no
thunder-cloud on the horizon to give hope, all had been dry and
sultry; dust and desolation yesterday, to-day a magnificent
stream, some 500 yards in width and from fifteen to twenty feet
in depth, flowed through the dreary desert! Bamboos and reeds,
with trash of all kinds, were hurried along the muddy waters.
Where were all the crowded inhabitants of the pool? The prison
doors were broken, the prisoners were released, and rejoiced in
the mighty stream of the Atbara.

The 24th June, 1861, was a memorable day. Although this was
actually the beginning of my work, I felt that by the experience
of this night I had obtained a clue to one portion of the Nile
mystery, and that, as "coming events cast their shadows before
them," this sudden creation of a river was but the shadow of the
great cause.

The rains were pouring in Abyssinia! these were sources of the
Nile!

One of my Turks, Hadji Achmet, was ill; therefore, although I
longed to travel, it was necessary to wait. I extract verbatim
from my journal, 26th June:--"The river has still risen; the
weather is cooler, and the withered trees and bushes are giving
signs of bursting into leaf. This season may be termed the spring
of this country. The frightful simoom of April, May, and June,
burns everything as though parched by fire, and not even a
withered leaf hangs to a bough, but the trees wear a wintry
appearance in the midst of intense heat. The wild geese have
paired, the birds are building their nests, and, although not
even a drop of dew has fallen, all Nature seems to be aware of an
approaching change, as the south wind blowing cool from the wet
quarter is the harbinger of rain. Already some of the mimosas
begin to afford a shade, under which the gazelles may be surely
found at mid-day; the does are now in fawn, and the young will be
dropped when this now withered land shall be green with herbage.

"Busy, packing for a start to-morrow; I send Hadji Velli back to
Berber in charge of the two hippos' heads to the care of the good
old Halleem Effendi. No time for shooting to-day. I took out all
the hippos' teeth, of which he possesses 40, 10--10,
------
10--10
six tusks and fourteen molars in each jaw. The bones of the
hippopotamus, like those of the elephant, are solid, and without
marrow."

CHAPTER III.

WILD ASSES OF THE DESERT.

THE journey along the margin of the Atbara was similar to the
entire route from Berber, a vast desert, with the narrow band of
trees that marked the course of the river; the only change was
the magical growth of the leaves, which burst hourly from the
swollen buds of the mimosas: this could be accounted for by the
sudden arrival of the river, as the water percolated rapidly
through the sand and nourished the famishing roots.

The tracks of wild asses had been frequent, but hitherto I had
not seen the animals, as their drinking-hour was at night, after
which they travelled far into the desert: however, on the morning
of the 29th June, shortly after the start at about 6 A.M., we
perceived three of these beautiful creatures on our left--an ass,
a female, and a foal. They were about half a mile distant when
first observed, and upon our approach to within half that
distance they halted and faced about; they were evidently on
their return to the desert from the river. Those who have seen
donkeys in their civilized state have no conception of the beauty
of the wild and original animal. Far from the passive and subdued
appearance of the English ass, the animal in its native desert is
the perfection of activity and courage; there is a high-bred tone
in the deportment, a high-actioned step when it trots freely over
the rocks and sand, with the speed of a horse when it gallops
over the boundless desert. No animal is more difficult of
approach; and, although they are frequently captured by the
Arabs, those taken are invariably the foals, which are ridden
down by fast dromedaries, while the mothers escape. The colour of
the wild ass is a reddish cream tinged with the shade most
prevalent of the ground that it inhabits; thus it much resembles
the sand of the desert. I wished to obtain a specimen, and
accordingly I exerted my utmost knowledge of stalking to obtain
a shot at the male. After at least an hour and a half I succeeded
in obtaining a long shot with a single rifle, which passed
through the shoulder, and I secured my first and last donkey. It
was with extreme regret that I saw my beautiful prize in the last
gasp, and I resolved never to fire another shot at one of its
race. This fine specimen was in excellent condition, although the
miserable pasturage of the desert is confined to the wiry herbage
already mentioned; of this the stomach was full, chewed into
morsels like chopped reeds. The height of this male ass was about
13.3 or 14 hands; the shoulder was far more sloping than that of
the domestic ass, the hoofs were remarkable for their size; they
were wide, firm, and as broad as those of a horse of 15 hands.
I skinned this animal carefully, and the Arabs divided the flesh
among them, while Hadji Achmet selected a choice piece for our
own dinner. At the close of our march that evening, the morsel of
wild ass was cooked in the form of "rissoles:" the flavour
resembled beef but it was extremely tough.

On the following day, 30th June, we reached Gozerajup, a large
permanent village on the south bank of the river. By dead
reckoning we had marched 246 miles from Berber. This spot was
therefore about 220 miles from the junction of the Atbara with
the Nile. Here we remained for a few days to rest the donkeys and
to engage fresh camels. An extract from my journal will give a
general idea of this miserable country:--

"July 3.--I went out early to get something for breakfast, and
shot a hare and seven pigeons. On my return to camp, an Arab
immediately skinned the hare, and pulling out the liver, lungs,
and kidneys, he ate them raw and bloody. The Arabs invariably eat
the lungs, liver, kidneys, and the thorax of sheep, gazelles, &c.
while they are engaged in skinning the beasts, after which they
crack the leg bones between stones, and suck out the raw marrow."

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