ou always
call me Hamza; that is what I am now. What do you think of this journey,
Ibrahim?"

Ibrahim shrugged his shoulders. "It is all the same to me; better here
than in boat. Soldier man good to fight, but very rough in tongue; call
Ibrahim all sorts of names, sometimes Darkie, sometimes Mate, sometimes
call him Nigger, that very bad, sah. One man call him Cockalorham. What
is Cockalorham, sah?"

Rupert laughed. "Cockalorum means nothing in particular, Ibrahim; it is
rather a friendly sort of address: it means good sort of fellow. That
wasn't so bad."

"No. That not so bad. Then one soldier call him Jocko; that name for a
monkey, sah; these things very unpleasant."

"But they don't mean anything, Ibrahim. They call each other all sorts
of names too."

"That so," Ibrahim said, nodding his head, "very funny names; often call
each other blooming something or other. Ibrahim always carry a
dictionary; he look out blooming; blooming same as blossoming, means
plants out in flower. Ibrahim could not make head or tail of them. Lots
of other words, bad words, Ibrahim could not understand."

"They do not mean anything, Ibrahim; it is just an ugly way of talking.
They all mean the same, 'very much' or 'very great,' nothing more or
less. Now we had better go on talking Arabic."

"No words like those in Arabic," Ibrahim said. "Arab man say what he
wants to say, proper words."

"I don't know, Ibrahim. When I have seen Arabs quarrelling they shout
and scream at each other, and though I don't know what they say I
should think they were using pretty strong expressions whatever they may
be."

"Yes, when angry call bad names, one understand that, my lord; but white
soldier and sailor use bad words when not angry at all."

"It is habit, Ibrahim, and a very bad habit; but, as I tell you, it
doesn't really mean anything. You see we have turned east," he went on
in Arabic.

Ibrahim nodded. "Not go straight to Metemmeh," he said. "I expect the
sheik is going round by Berber."

Such proved to be the case, for when they halted for the night the sheik
explained to Rupert, by means of Ibrahim, that he intended to follow the
course of the river for the present. He should keep on the edge of the
desert until they had passed the point at which the boat expedition had
arrived. There would be no chance of the prisoner having been brought
down anywhere in the neighbourhood of the British, but as most of the
tribes had sent contingent