CHAPTER XXXV.
JOURNEY THROUGH DAR EL-MÀHASS AND SUKKÔT.
We start for Wadi-Halfa—The Plague of Black Gnats—Mohammed’s Coffin—The Island of Argo—Market-Day—Scenery of the Nile—Entering Dar El-Màhass—Ruined Fortresses—The Camel-Men—A Rocky Chaos—Fakir Bender—The Akaba of Màhass—Camp in the Wilderness—The Charm of Desolation—The Nile again—Pilgrims from Dar-Fūr—The Struggle of the Nile—An Arcadian Landscape—The Temple of Soleb—Dar Sukkôt—The Land of Dates—The Island of Sai—A Sea of Sand—Camp by the River—A Hyena Barbecue.
We left El Ordee or New Dongola, before sunrise on the twenty-ninth of February. A boy of about fourteen years old came out from the town, helped load the camels, and insisted on accompanying me to Cairo. As my funds were diminishing, and I had no need of additional service, I refused to take him, and he went home greatly disappointed. We were all in fine health and spirits, from the two days’ rest, and our ships of the Desert sailed briskly along the sands, with the palmy coasts green and fair on our right. For some miles from the town the land is tolerably well cultivated, but the grain was all much younger than in the neighborhood of Old Dongola. Beyond this, the country was again deserted and melancholy; everywhere villages in ruin, fields given up to sand and thorns, and groves of date trees wasting their vigor in rank, unpruned shoots. The edge of the Desert was covered with graveyards to a considerable extent, each one boasting its cluster of pyramids and cones, raised over the remains of holy shekhs. Towards noon I dismounted for breakfast in a grove of sont trees, but had no sooner seated myself on my carpet, than the small black flies came in such crowds that I was scarcely able to eat. They assailed my temples, ears, eyes and nostrils, and it was utterly impossible to drive them away. I was half crazy with the infliction, and at night my neck and temples were swollen and covered with blotches worse than those made by mosquito stings. In fact, mosquitoes are mild and merciful in comparison. Had not my road been mostly in the Desert, away from the trees, I could scarcely have endured the journey. The few inhabitants along the river kindled fires of green wood and sat in the smoke.
In the afternoon the monotony of the Desert on the western bank was broken by a solitary mountain of a remarkable form. It precisely resembled an immense coffin, the ends being apparently cut square off, and as the effect of a powerful mirage lifted it above the horizon, it seemed like the sarcophagus of the Prophet, in the Kaaba, to be suspended between heaven and earth. The long island of Argo, which I saw occasionally across an arm of the Nile, appeared rich and well cultivated. It belongs mostly to Melek Hammed, King of Dongola, who was expected at home the day I passed, on his return from Cairo, where he had been three months or more, for the purpose of representing to Abbas Pasha the distressed condition of the country, and obtaining some melioration of the system of misrule inflicted upon it. Near the town of Argo, on the opposite side of the island my map indicated a ruined temple, and I made a strong effort to see it; but at Binni, which was the nearest point, there was no ferry, and the people knew nothing of the temple nor of any thing else. I left the main road and followed the bank, but the terrible flies drove me away, and so, maddened and disgusted, I came at last to a sakia, where the people informed me that the ferry was still ahead and the ruins already some distance behind me. They said this deliberately and carelessly, sitting like black spectres in the midst of thick smoke, while I was crazily beating my ears. “Tell the caravan to go ahead,” I said to Achmet, at length, “and don’t talk to me of temples until we have got away from these flies.”
The next morning Achmet had some difficulty in awaking me, so wrapt was I in dreams of home. I sat shivering in the cool air, trying to discover who and where I was, but the yellow glimmer of my tent-lining in the dim light of dawn soon informed me. During the day we passed through a more thickly settled country, and owing to the partial cultivation of the soil, were less troubled by that Nubian plague, which is always worse about the ruined villages and the fields given up to halfeh grass. It was market-day at the village of Hafier, and we met and passed many natives, some with baskets of raw cotton and some with grain. I noticed one man riding a donkey and carrying before him a large squash, for which he would possibly get twenty paràs (2½ cents). My camel-men, who had neglected to buy dourra in El Ordee, wanted to stop until noon in order to get it, and as I would not wait, remained behind.
The scenery had a wild and picturesque air, from the isolated mountain peaks, which now appeared on both sides of the river Djebel Arambo, with its high, precipitous sides and notched summit, stood steeped in soft purple vapor—a beautiful object above the long lines of palms and the green level of the islands in the river. The fields on the western bank were mostly taken up with young wheat, though I saw a single one of ripe barley, which a black Baràbra was reaping, cutting off the stalks about one-third of the way below the heads, and depositing them in heaps. By noon, I knew from the landmarks that we must be opposite the island of Tombos, where there are some ruins. I made inquiries for it, but the bank was almost deserted, and the few inhabitants I found gathered in straw huts here and there among the rank palm-groves, could tell me nothing about it. All agreed, however, that there was no ferry at this part of the Nile, and to swim across was out of the question. The crocodiles swarm here, and are quite delicate in their tastes, much preferring white flesh to black. So my hope of Tombos vanished like that of Argo.
Beyond the island is a little ruined village, called Hannek, and here I took leave of Dar Dongola, in which I had been travelling ten days, and entered Dar El-Màhass, the kingdom of my friend Melek Dyaab. The character of the country changed on the very border. Long ridges of loose blocks of sandstone and granite, as at Assouan and Akaba Gerri, in Soudân, appeared in front, at first on the western bank, but soon throwing their lines across the stream and forming weirs and rapids in its current. The river is quite narrow, in some places not a hundred yards broad, and leads a very tortuous course, bearing away towards the north-west, until it meets the majestic barrier of Djebel Foga, when it turns to the north-east. About two hours after passing Djebel Arambo, which stands opposite the northern extremity of Tombos, we reached the large and hilly island of Mosul, where the river divides its waters and flows for several miles through deep, crooked, rocky channels, before they meet again. Here there is no cultivation, the stony ridges running to the water’s edge. The river-bed is so crowded and jammed with granite rocks, that from the shore it appears in some places to be entirely cut off. At this point there are three castellated mud ruins in sight, which at a distance resemble the old feudal fortresses of Europe. The one nearest which we passed was quadrangular, with corner bastions, three round and one square, all tapering inward towards the top. The lower part of the wall was stone and the upper part mud, while the towers were nearly fifty feet high. That on an island in the river, strongly resembled an Egyptian temple, with its pylons, porticoes, and walls of circuit. They were evidently built before the Turkish invasion, and were probably frontier forts of the Kings of El-Màhass; to prevent incursions from the side of Dongola.
We reached the eastern base of Djebel Foga about four o’clock, and I thought it best to encamp, on account of the camel-men, who had a walk of twenty-three miles with bags of dourra on their shoulders, before they could reach us. I had no sooner selected a place for my tent, on the top of a high bank overlooking the river, than they appeared, much fatigued and greatly vexed at me for leaving them in the lurch. I ordered my pipe to be filled, and smoked quietly, making no reply to their loud complaints, and in a short time the most complete harmony prevailed in our camp. The Nile at this place flowed in the bottom of a deep gorge, filled with rocks. The banks were almost perpendicular, but covered with a rich growth of halfeh, which our camels greedily cropped, at the hazard of losing their balance and tumbling down into the river. I fancied there was already a taste of Egypt in the mountain air, and flattered myself that I had breathed the last of the languid atmosphere of Soudân.
The next morning led us deeper into the rocky chaos. The bed of the Nile was properly a gorge, so deep was it sunk among the stony hills, and confined within such narrow limits. The ridges of loose blocks of granite and porphyry roll after each other like waves, and their crests assume the most fantastic variety of forms. They are piled in heaps and balanced on each other, topped with round boulders or thrown together in twos and threes, as if some brood of Titan children had been at play in those regions and were frightened away in the midst of their employment. It is impossible to lose the impression that some freak of human or superhuman fancy gave the stones their quaint grouping. Between the ridges are shallow hollows, terminating towards the west in deep, rocky clefts, and opening on the river in crescent-like coves, between the jaggy headlands which tumble their boulders into its bed. High peaks, or rather conical piles of porphyry rock, rise here and there out of this sterile chaos. Toward the east, where the Nile winds away in a long chain of mazy curves, they form ranges and show compact walls and pinnacles. The few palms and the little eddies of wheat sprinkled along both banks of the river, are of a glorious depth and richness of hue, by contrast with the gray and purple wastes of the hills. In the sweet, clear air of the morning, the scenery was truly inspiring, and I rode over the high ridges in a mood the very opposite of that I had felt the day previous.