There Was No
Time To Be Lost In Completing My Permanent Camp; I Therefore Sent
For The Sheik Of The
Village, and proceeded to purchase a house.
I accompanied him through the narrow lanes of Sofi, and was
quickly shown
A remarkably neat house, which I succeeded in
purchasing from the owner for the sum of ten piastres (two
shillings). This did not seem an extravagant outlay for a neat
dwelling with a sound roof; neither were there any legal expenses
in the form of conveyance, as in that happy and practical land
the simple form of conveyance is the transportation of the house
(the roof) upon the shoulders of about thirty men, and thus it is
conveyed to any spot that the purchaser may consider desirable.
Accordingly, our mansion was at once seized by a crowd of Arabs,
and carried off in triumph, while the sticks that formed the wall
were quickly arranged upon the site I had chosen for our camp. In
the short space of about three hours I found myself the
proprietor of an eligible freehold residence, situated upon an
eminence in park-like grounds, commanding extensive and romantic
views of the beautifully-wooded valley of the Atbara, within a
minute's walk of the neighbouring village of Sofi, perfect
immunity from all poor-rates, tithes, taxes, and other public
burthens, not more than 2,000 miles from a church, with the
advantage of a post-town at the easy distance of seventy leagues.
The manor comprised the right of shooting throughout the parishes
of Ahyssinia and Soudan, plentifully stocked with elephants,
lions, rhinoceroses, giraffes, buffaloes, hippopotami, leopards,
and a great variety of antelopes; while the right of fishing
extended throughout the Atbara and neighbouring rivers, that were
well stocked with fish ranging from five to a hundred and fifty
pounds; also with turtles and crocodiles.
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