- Rain fell throughout the night, which makes everybody
miserable. During the middle watch, having been awakened by the heavy
shower, I heard the sentry outside my tent muttering a kind of low
chant: - 'This is the country for rain and potatoes; this is the place
for potatoes and rain. Potatoes and rain, potatoes and rain; rain and
potatoes, rain and potatoes.'
"Neither the rain nor the potatoes were esteemed by the troops. The
roots were almost as watery as the rain, and their sweetness was
excessive. A very uncomfortable result from this vapid food was extreme
flatulence. The waist-belts of the boys were obliged to be let out by
several holes at the buckles. As my men justly declared, 'They were
uncomfortably full after a meal; but half-an-hour's march made them feel
as though they had fasted for a day.'
"During the afternoon I was sitting beneath a shady tree, with my wife
and Lieutenant Baker, when a naked native rushed wildly past the
sentries, and, before he could be restrained threw himself on the ground
and embraced my feet, at the same time begging for mercy by the Arabic
ejaculation, 'Aman! aman!'
"He was immediately seized. On examination through an interpreter, it
appeared that he was a native of Koitch, near Fatiko, and that he had
attached himself to Suleiman's party at some former time, but now he had
just escaped from the Foweera station, as Suleiman wished to kill him.
