I Had Not Returned These Vessels Earlier, As I Required All The Sailors
To Assist In Building The Station, And In Collecting Corn For The
Troops.
At this season (October) the Nile was at its maximum, therefore
I hoped there would be no difficulty in the return voyage to Khartoum
with empty vessels, and the stream in their favour.
Had I returned them
earlier, I should have been obliged to victual them for a four months'
voyage, at a time when corn was extremely scarce. The sailors had now
assisted us in our work, and they would not require provisions for more
than two months, as the Nile was full.
Every arrangement that I had made had been most carefully considered.
There can be no doubt that the greatest enemy to the expedition was the
White Nile. This adverse river had given a serious check. The work and
fatigue in cutting through the obstructions had killed many men, and had
laid the seeds of fatal complaints among many others. The men's hearts
had been broken at the onset. There was even now a feeling of despair of
the possibility of receiving supplies and reinforcements by river from
Khartoum. We appeared to have forsaken the known world, and, having
passed the river Styx, to have become secluded for ever in a wild land
of our own, where all were enemies, like evil spirits, and where it was
necessary either to procure food at the point of the bayonet, or to lie
down and die.
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