Chapter XIV

Additions to our party — Skeleton guides — Lost in the desert — Surefootedness of the camel — The well — A horrible story — Nubian despotism — An Arab’s revenge.

We started from Aboohamed at ten o’clock on the morning of the 22nd of January, for it was far too cold to have attempted it earlier.

We had some additions to our party. One was a man who had escaped from the jail at Fazokl—at least so said the Governor of Aboohamed; though he retracted his assertion on being presented with a dollar. There was a suspicious coincidence, however, in the knowledge the man evidently had of the state of felon society in that Botany Bay of a place, which was not to be expected from one who visited it solely for pleasure. Perhaps he was not the most desirable acquaintance we could have selected, but as he made himself extremely handy in pitching tents, we were glad to have assisted in freeing him from his bonds.

Our other acquisition was a fat sheep, that was to walk as well, if not better than a camel. I did not believe a word of this; and was not at all surprised on finding that he did not answer his warranty in the quality of pedestrianism. He was therefore transformed into mutton with as little delay as possible.

The first day our route lay over undulating plains, that were as firm and as smooth as a gravel road. There were twenty paths at least; but had we lost our way, the skeletons of the numerous camels which covered the road and tainted the air, would have shown us the right one.

Then we entered the chains of hills among which we wound, often through narrow passes, where the ground was marked by deep water-courses, and covered at this season by plants of three or four kinds, on which the camels fed with great relish.

After passing these, we came to a long tract of deep sand, where we wandered on for hours, without finding a place sufficiently firm to pitch a tent; and then entered another chain of hills, mostly of a conical shape, and very picturesquely grouped.

Here we were nearly lost; for, after watching our caravan descending the plain beneath us, and apparently entering a defile, we discovered that the distance was much greater than we thought it had been; for it took two hours’ riding before we reached the defile, when it was quite dark, and there was no signs of the caravan, which we had ordered to stop at sunset. On we wandered, in some anxiety, when suddenly one of our party happening to cast a backward glance, discovered a light. For this we immediately made, and had the gratification to find that it proceeded from our people, who had wandered out of the direct road in search of forage for their camels, which they did not find.

After this adventure, we lingered very little in the rear, and found ourselves obliged to curtail our mid-day rests.

We now entered the hilly district that crosses the line of desert, and ascended and descended passes along narrow rocky paths, better adapted to the light foot of the gazelles, than the broad and heavy tread of the camels; and it was wonderful how these large animals, with their cumbrous burthens, scrambled among the rocks, and along the edge of precipices, without the slightest hesitation.

A long descent through a narrow pass at last brought us to a circular plain, in the centre of which is the well. On approaching it, we found a large drove of camels mounted by a few wild-looking Arabs. Encamped too within the arena was a Turkish caravan, on one side, and an Arab phan with its round low tents established on the other. So we crossed the plain, and pitched our tents on the opposite side, where entirely exposed to the sun, we found the heat most oppressive.

The well consists of two large and deep holes cut in the sand, and is situated in a valley so entirely surrounded by high hills, that on arriving there it was difficult to say whence we had come, or where we could go. The water was extremely salt, and even when made into soup was scarcely drinkable.

The camels were immediately driven away, to feed in the neighbouring pastures—they were not valleys, for they were all on the level plain; out of them, however, rose the hills, often perpendicularly.

We also despatched two water-carrying camels with ten small skins to a pool of capital rain-water to be found among the rocks at about half a day’s journey, which was reported to be sweet.

Daireh told us a horrible story while we were here, which I will give in his own words.

“When Mahoh Bey, that some years ago was going to make Governess of that part of the country, wanted some camels from the head man of the road, the man could not stand what he wanted, because it was too hard what he wanted—because he would not allow his tribe to be pressed. I don’t know what you call it.

“So the Governess gave him much stick with large pole, called nabout; then he die a few days after. After the man die, this Mahoh Bey make government for some year in the country, and he died, after some year make Governor at Berber.

“When he died, his children and wife obliged to come back to Cairo, because they have no money to take care of them there. And they gather all their father’s money and property, and take the road from Aboohamed to Korosko.

“They take the son of the murdered Sheik as guide, as they found he was a capital young man; so made him great Sheik as his father was, and give him fine dress and good backsheesh to console him.

“And when the Sheik had guided the Governess wife, and children, and brought them all very well from Berber to El Murat (the well), at this place they were obliged to stop one day to water the camel and to rest.

“Then one of the camel people who was clever young man, made singing, reminding the young guide how his father had been murdered by the father of this family under his care. Then it entered into the mind of this young man, to take his father’s blood back again.

“So he guide them one day more, not in the road, but a little to the left of the pass, and he select the big son of Mohah Bey, which is quite a man, and he call him away from his mother in the middle of the night, and say to him:

“‘Come, and your father kill my father, I do the same to you, to pay for my father.’

“And the poor son try to prevent himself with as much money as he could, but he cannot, they won’t stand him. So they kill him. When they had cut his neck, they go back to his mother.

“His Bedouins which he had with him wished to kill all, so that no one know what come to the rest, but the son of the Sheik he only take one instead of his father, and then he rob all the rest, take every money they got, and all their jewels and clothes, and he give them twenty men to take care of them, and send them back again to Aboohamed, and he send message with them to the Ababdee people to ruin Aboohamed and to join him in the desert near the well, and he do the same at Korosko.

“He broke the corn magazine at that place, and take all the corn, &c., to the desert with him; and he going to the desert and make very large encampment at Aboohamed, and at the well, with very large troops, armed with guns, and spears, and shields.

“And when the wife of the Governess arrive at Berber, she let all the Government know, and the Government pay her all her losses, even more than what she lost, and sent very big troops of Armenians, and also a lot of Bedouins, who were not friends to the Ababda people, and go to them in the desert, and stop all their way from all sides of the mountains.

“And they begin to fight together very hard for one day. Twenty people of the Ababdee are killed, and sixteen people of the Government people killed, instead.

“When the Ababdee finished their powder, they pull up a very white flag and say they come to the Governor, and do whatever he wish. Then they take them all to Khartoum, and make them pay £50,000, instead of the money taken, and of the expenses of fight.

“Then the Ababdee stand it, and Ali Bey Hassib make his cousin Sheik, as unless one of the family are Sheik, the Ababdee will not keep quiet. So they keep the big Sheik at Khartoum, to answer for the behaviour of his tribe.”

So ends my tale.

This disturbance took place while we were passing Korosko in our boats on our way to Wady Halfa. Our original intention was to start from Korosko and return by Dongola and Wady Halfa, but the desert being in such an unsettled state, we thought it wiser to change our plans, though we should have run no actual risk by travelling among the people, even while in a state of rebellion, as strangers are always respected.