ured six to nine inclies in length, with pointed head
and tail. This happened several times to him; hut
he thought that until he got rid of the great one,
which he called their “ mother,” the disease would
stick to him. On our arrival at Khartoom I prescribed
half a tumbler of salt dissolved in water ; but having
once tried my remedy, the Seedees pronounced it too
nauseous to try a second time. Speke, half-a-dozen
of our twenty Seedees, and myself, were the only men
of our expedition who escaped this disease.
The Nile at Gondokoro is in two branches ; the
main one lying on the right, and a small low island,
on which cattle feed, divides it from the left branch.
The old banks were at this season fifteen feet above
the alluvial deposit of the river, which again was four
feet out of water. There seemed a greater body of
water, because it was spread over a larger surface, than
when we had seen it thirty miles farther up. Here
the strongest current, bearing to the right, was about
three miles an hour, and the breadth a hundred and
fifty yards. Standing upon the bank, and- looking
around, the country presents a flat Egyptian aspect,
with the solitary hills of Rujub, Beeleenja, &c., to the
N.W., S.W., and S. The water was full of lake debris,
making it muddy and disagreeable to drink until allowed
to settle. All day long parties of three and
four natives swam across, resting upon a log of the
pith tree or ambadj. They do not swim as we do in
England, but stretch out their arms alternately over
the water, crowing loudly “ow, ow,” as they go merrily
across. Although there were small canoes on the
river they were not often used, even when produce was
to be conveyed from one bank to the other. They got
sooner over by swimming, and when a cow was killed
on the opposite bank, its meat was placed inside the
inflated skin, and propelled through the water by the
man swimming behind it. Crocodiles were no doubt
numerous, but we saw no accident; they must be
frightened by the number of people who daily cross at
this point. We heard from Petherick of crocodiles as
high as a table, and twenty-five feet long. At night
the stillness was often broken by the trumpets of the
hippopotami, which sound softer and more musical than
when heard during the day. Baker had an excellent
fishing-net, with which, in a jolly-boat, his men would
cross the river to still water, and in a couple of hours
bring back half-a-dozen species. Some resembled herring
in shape, but the best for eating was a large flat
fish, Of birds, the most interesting was a scarlet and
green fly-catcher, which nestles in the perpendicular
banks of the Nile like a swallow. We had not met
with it on the journey. I t took short flights, rapidly
skimming the air, and then resting for a moment on
the brink of the bank. From the Nyam Nyam country
to the west very handsome black goats are brought,
remarkable for their small size and long hair. I t may
be worth mentioning that we here saw leeches, which
we- had not met with in any previous part of our
journey; whereas, in the Himalayas, one cannot go
through the grass returning from a day’s sport without
having a dozen of them fastened on one’s legs.
Gondokoro presented quite the appearance of a seaport,
there being twenty large boats anchored there.
We had understood it to be an outlandish place—dangerous
and almost inaccessible. But for the last five-
and-twenty years or more it has been a mission-station
2 A