The Nile is not half as broad as the Bahar el Abiud, which is, from bank to bank, one mile higher than where the Nile joins it, about a mile and a quarter in breadth. It comes, as far as we can see it, from the west-south-west. The Nile of Bruce must, therefore, after the expedition of Ismael Pasha, be considered as a branch of a great and unexplored river, which may possibly be found to be connected with the Niger.
On the 27th, early in the morning, the Pasha commenced transporting the army over the Bahar el Abiud, by means of nine small boats, which had been able to pass the third Cataract, and follow the army. The country on our side of the Bahar el Abiud, is uncultivated, and apparently without inhabitants. The army is encamped by the side of the river, on a beautiful plain of good soil, extending a considerable distance back towards the desert. During the inundation, this plain becomes evidently an island, as there is a channel worn by water, in the rear of it, at this season dry. The tracks of the hippopotamus are found throughout this plain.
By the 29th, in the afternoon, i.e. in two days and a half, the Pasha had finished transporting into Sennaar the whole of his camp, consisting of about six thousand persons, with the artillery, ammunition, tents, baggage, horses, camels, and asses, by the aid of nine boats, none of them large, an expedition, I believe, unparalleled in the annals of Turkish warfare.[47]
During our stay on the other side of the Bahar el Abiud, it was reported in the camp that some of the Mogrebin soldiers, gone out to shoot gazelles, had killed in the desert which lies off from the river, an animal, resembling a bull, except that its feet were like those of a camel. I did not see this animal, but the story was affirmed to me by several.
The army, on its crossing the Bahar el Abiud, encamped on the point of land just below which the Bahar el Abiud and the Nile join each other. The water of the Bahar el Abiud is troubled and whitish, and has a peculiar sweetish taste. The soldiers said that "the water of the Bahar el Abiud would not quench thirst." This notion probably arose from the circumstance that they were never tired of drinking it, it is so light and sweet. The water of the Nile is at present perfectly pure and transparent, but by no means so agreeable to the palate as that of the Bahar el Abiud, as I experimented myself, drinking first of the Bahar el Abiud, and then walking about two hundred yards across the point, and drinking of the Nile, the water of which appeared to me hard and tasteless in comparison.
Nothing of the kind could be easier than to ascend the Bahar el Abiud from the place where we are. A canja, well manned and armed, and accompanied by another boat containing provisions for four or six months, and both furnished with grapnels to enable them at night to anchor in the river, might, in my opinion, ascend and return securely: as the tribes on its borders have great dread of fire-arms, and will hardly dare to meddle with those who carry them.
We stayed on the Sennaar side of the Bahar el Abiud till the 1st of Ramadan, when the army commenced its march for Sennaar, the capital, proceeding by the bank of the Nile.[48]
The army reached Sennaar in thirteen days. The signal for striking the tents and loading the camels was generally fired about two hours after midnight. One hour was allowed for loading the baggage, when a second cannon was fired, and the march of the army commenced, and was continued each day till about two or three hours before noon, when the camp reposed till about two hours after midnight of the same day. The army suffered severely during this march; nothing was given to the troops for subsistence but durra, unground, which the soldiers were frequently in great distress to obtain the means of making into meal, in order to bake a little miserable bread, which was all they had to eat.[49] For myself, I was reduced to great extremity. The camel, carrying my provisions and culinary utensils, and several other articles, was lost by the carelessness of a domestic. I was consequently left without any thing to eat, or the means of preparing what I might obtain. I threw myself under the hospitable shade of the tent of Mr. Caillaud, (then only occupied by Mr. Constant, his companion,) the gentleman I have mentioned in the Preface with so much well merited esteem, where I stayed till my arrival at Sennaar.
The country we traversed is that part of the kingdom of Sennaar which lies between the Nile and the Bahar el Abiud. It is an immense and fertile plain, occupied by numerous villages, some of them very large; that of "Wahat Medinet," for instance, containing, probably, four or five thousand inhabitants. What country we saw was, at this season, perfectly naked of grass, consisting generally of immense fields which, in the season past, had been planted with durra. Acacia trees, and bushes in the country far back from the river, (which is sandy,) were abundant, but no herbage was visible; I did not see throughout our route a single waterwheel;[50] and I believe that the country is only cultivated when the inundation has retired.
The houses of the villages are built in the following manner. A circle of stakes is planted in the ground, a conical frame of poles attached to these stakes below, and meeting and fastened at the top of the cone, forms the roof. This roof, and the sides of the house, are then covered with thatched straw, which suffices to exclude the rains.