e of a thunderstorm, they headed down
stream and got away. According to them, the dervishes were killing all
the Jaalin who were suspected of trying to escape north, and the
Shaggieh and other northern tribesmen stood in little better plight.
All natives, other than blacks and Baggara, who could get away from
Omdurman were running off, as they believed the fall of the dervish
rule was assured. The Khalifa's son, Osman, whose title was Sheikh
Ed-Din, wanted to make terms. For months the youth had been in
disgrace, but his father had reinstated him in the position of
Commander-in-Chief of the Forces. Osman openly declared that fighting
against the Sirdar and the English was hopeless, and that it was wiser
to try and treat with us. Khalifa Abdullah and his brother Yacoub,
however, would not hear of treating for peace, urging that their own
people in that event would kill them. The only possible course was war
to the death. From an excellent source I learned that the dervishes
were well supplied with guns and ammunition, and that the Khalifa had
about five millions sterling of treasure laid by.

From Kitaib can be seen the dozen pyramids of Meroe, part of the
kingdom of the famous Queen of Sheba. To right and left upon the
opposite bank are catacombs, ruins of old temples, towns and forts of
a bygone civilisation. The country on both sides of the Nile in that
region has spacious alluvial belts, big as the Fayoum and as
susceptible to the arts of the cultivator. Such hills as there are
rise for the most part abruptly from flat land capable of limitless
irrigation. To anticipate somewhat: the region, south of Abu Hamed, up
to and even beyond Khartoum, has all the natural advantages of Lower
Egypt and something more. Berber is but 245 miles from Suakin. The
Nubian kingdom of antiquity, or that of the Queen of Sheba, must have
been of enormous extent, marvellous fertility and great richness.
Ethiopia may yet fulfil the prophecy. From Kitaib we marched about
eighteen miles to Maguia, passing through a forest of mimosa bush, the
track but rarely branching out amongst the halfa-grass upon the more
open country. About three p.m. the column turned in towards a side
stream and settled down near the village of Maguia. The wind rose as
usual at night, yet for all that the bivouac was fairly good, and
there was plenty of grazing. Next day, the 19th, we managed to make an
early start, getting away about 5.30 a.m. The distance to be trave