Travellers may often unjustly condemn a fish as worthless, because it
may have been out of season when they had the opportunity of eating it.
I never tasted any fresh-water fish superior to a boulti, slightly
salted, and smoked for twelve or eighteen hours.
In hot climates all fish should be split down the back, and laid open;
they should then be salted and should lie for a few hours to drain;
after which they should be hung over the smoke of a dry-wood fire. This
treatment renders them delicious for immediate use, but if required to
keep, they must be smoked for a couple of days, and then be highly dried
in the sun.
The 14th December was the Mohammedan holiday called the "Ume el Ete," on
which day every person, however poor he or she may be, is supposed to
dress in new clothes.
We had now been upwards of twelve months without communication with
Khartoum. The soldiers' clothes were reduced to rags, as they had
suffered much from hard work and fighting in thorny bush. The whole
force was in despair:
