zed more consciously, and, with a gleam of joy in his eyes,
said:

"A white boy!--I again see a white one! I welcome you whoever you are.
Did you speak of some sick girl? What do you want of me?"

Stas repeated that the sick girl was Nell, the daughter of Mr.
Rawlinson, one of the directors of the Canal; that she already had
suffered from two attacks of fever and must die if he did not obtain
quinine to prevent the third.

"Two attacks--that is bad!" answered the unknown. "But I can give you
as much quinine as you want. I have several jars of it which are of no
use to me now."

Speaking thus, he ordered little Nasibu to hand him a big tin box,
which apparently was a small traveling drug store; he took out of it
two rather large jars filled with a powder and gave them to Stas.

"This is half of what I have. It will last you for a year even."

Stas had a desire to shout from sheer delight, so he began to thank him
with as much rapture as if his own life were involved.

The unknown nodded his head several times, and said:

"Good, good, my name is Linde; I am a Swiss from Zurich. Two days ago I
met with an accident. A wart-hog wounded me severely."

Afterwards he addressed the lad:

"Nasibu, fill my pipe."

Then he said to Stas:

"In the night-time the fever is worse and my mind becomes confused. But
a pipe clears my thoughts. Truly, did you say that you had escaped from
dervish captivity and are hiding in the jungle? Is it so?"

"Yes, sir. I said it."

"And what do you intend to do?"

"Fly to Abyssinia."

"You will fall into the hands of the Mahdists; whose divisions are
prowling all along the boundary."

"We cannot, however, undertake anything else."

"Ah, a month ago I could still have given you aid. But now I am
alone--dependent only upon Divine mercy and that black lad."

Stas gazed at him with astonishment.

"And this camp?"

"It is the camp of death."

"And those negroes?"

"Those negroes are sleeping and will not awaken any more."

"I do not understand--"

"They are suffering from the sleeping sickness.* [* Recent
investigations have demonstrated that this disease is inoculated in
people by the bite of the same fly "tsetse" which kills oxen and
horses. Nevertheless its bite causes the sleeping sickness only in
certain localities. During the time of the Mahdist rebellion the cause
of the disease was unknown.] Those are men from beyond the Great Lakes
where this terrible disease is co