shot, about twenty times, in quick succession. I saw
with the telescope a crowd of men about three hundred
yards distant, standing on a white ant-hill raised above
the green sea of high reeds, from which elevated point
they were keeping up a dropping fire at some object
indistinguishable in the high grass. The death-howl
was soon raised, and the men rushing down from their
secure position, shortly appeared, carrying with them
my best choush, Sali Achmet, dead. He had come
suddenly upon the buffalo, who, although disabled,
had caught him in the deep mud and killed him.
His gallant comrades bolted, although he called to
them for assistance, and they had kept up a distant
fire from the lofty ant-hill, instead of rushing to his
rescue. The buffalo lay dead; and a grave was immediately
dug for the unfortunate Sali. My journey
begins badly with the death of my good man Johann
and my best ehoush—added to the constant mishaps
of the “Clumsy.” Fortunately I did not start from
Khartoum on a Friday, or the unlucky day would
have borne the onus of all the misfortunes.
The graves of the Arabs are an improvement upon
those of Europeans. What poor person who cannot
afford a vault, has not felt a pang as the clod fell
upon the coffin of his relative ? The Arabs avoid this.
Although there is no coffin, the rude earth does mot
rest upon the body. The hole being dug similar in
shape to a European grave, an extra trench is formed
at the bottom of the grave about a foot wide. The
body is laid upon its side within this trench, and covered
by bricks made of clay which are laid across;—thus
the body is contained within a narrow vault. Mud is
then smeared over the hastily made bricks, and nothing
is visible; the tomb being made level with the bottom
of the large grave. This is filled up with earth, which,
resting on the brick covering of the trench, cannot
press upon the body. In such a grave my best man
was laid—the Slave women raising their horrible howling
and my men crying loudly, as well explained in the
words of Scripture, “ and he lifted up his voice and
wept.” I was glad to see so much external feeling for
their comrade, but the grave being filled, their grief,
like all loud sorrow, passed quickly away and relapsed
into thoughts of buffalo meat; they were soon
busily engaged in cutting up the flesh. There are
two varieties of buffaloes in this part of Africa—the
Bos Caffer, with convex horns, and that with flat horns;
this was the latter species. A horn had entered the
man’s thigh, tearing the whole of the muscles from the
bone; there was also a wound from the centre of the
throat to the ear, thus completely torn open, severing
the jugular vein. One rib was broken, also the breast