I Begged Him To Procure Me Thirty Good Blacks At
Khartoum, And To Bring Them With Him To Gondokoro Next Season, Where I
Arranged To Meet Him.
This he agreed to, and I returned to my tent
delighted at a chance of escaping complete failure, although I thus
encountered a delay of twelve months before I could commence my
legitimate voyage.
That accomplished, I was comparatively happy; the
disgrace of returning to Khartoum beaten would have been insupportable.
That night I slept well, and we sat under our shady tree by the
tent-door at sunrise on the following morning, drinking our coffee with
contentment. Presently, from a distance, I saw Koorshid, the Circassian,
approaching with his partner. Coffee and pipes were ready instanter:
both the boy Saat and Richarn looked upon him as a friend and ally, as
it was arranged that ten of his hunters were to accompany us. Before he
sipped his coffee he took me by the hand, and with great confusion of
manner he confessed that he was ashamed to come and visit me. "The
moment you left me yesterday," said he, "I called my vakeel and headman,
and ordered them to select the ten best men of my party to accompany
you; but instead of obeying me as usual, they declared that nothing
would induce them to serve under you; that you were a spy who would
report their proceedings to the Government, and that they should all be
ruined; that you were not only a spy on the slave-trade, but that you
were a madman, who would lead them into distant and unknown countries,
where both you and your wife and they would all be murdered by the
natives; thus they would mutiny immediately, should you be forced upon
them." My last hope was gone.
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