betrayed; these unfortunate men had had nothing to eat for
three days, so I gave them a few piastres which I had brought for
Neufeld, and as I did not dare to stay longer with them I begged Zogheir
to look after them.

Fifteen days afterwards I returned and found the poor men stretched out
dead under the wall, they had died of starvation, and the guards had
just come to knock off their chains and carry their bodies out of the
yard. The sight of these two Ababdehs filled my heart with sadness;
there they lay, nothing but a mass of skin and bone; they had come to
help poor captives to escape, and this was their own miserable end.
This, indeed, was a warning to me to act with increased prudence and
caution.

An Egyptian, born in the Sudan, was also sent to the Saier for a few
months for declaring that he was the fourth Khalifa--_i.e._ the Khalifa
Osman. One day this individual had presented himself to the Khalifa and
begged to be heard for a few moments as he wished to tell him of a dream
he had had. It is quite an ordinary occurrence for the Ansar to relate
dreams flattering to the Khalifa, in the hope of getting some bakshish.

Thus did our Khalifa Osman relate that in his dream or vision he had
beheld the Mahdi, who told him to declare himself the fourth Khalifa,
and therefore he begged that Abdullah would confirm him as such and
permit him to take his share of authority with the other Khalifas; he
also begged that all the honour due to him as Khalifa Osman should be
forthwith paid to him.

[Illustration: CHARLES NEUFELD.]

This poor madman paid dearly for his dream. Abdullah merely made a sign
to one of his body-guard, on which he was hurried off to the Saier,
where he received fifty lashes twice a day, and was eventually obliged
to confess that the devil had tempted him to strive after this position.

Charles Neufeld remained in the prison longer than any one else. I have
narrated in a previous chapter how he had daringly joined Saleh's people
with the intention of establishing commercial relations with the Arabs,
and how he was entrapped by the Dervishes at the oasis of Selimeh. This
good man knew nothing of the Sudan and nothing about Mahdiism, and it
was just at this time that the Khalifa had made up his mind to crush
Saleh and his Kababish.

On the 7th of March, Neufeld arrived in Omdurman--a prisoner under a
strong escort. News spread like wildfire that an English pasha had been
captured, and this caused