Page:A Prisoner of the Khaleefa.djvu/302

240 as he had no reply from me to the letter sent, or any evidence to show that the letter had been sent. He has borrowed some money here, for which I have gone bail for fifty pounds, and Onoor promises to be back in three months' time with news from you and the money required for my support and escape. The course of the war will soon deliver us alive or dead from the hands of this savage rabble.

"The greater part of the arsenal has been moved over to the Beit-el-Mal at Omdurman owing to the war, and the remaining material will follow very shortly, and I will go over with it, when I may have an opportunity of meeting Onoor if nothing occurs to disturb the extremely good relations existing between myself and my present masters. Please give Onoor (here follows a list of medicines); practising medicine facilitates my communication with the outer world. I hope Onoor will find with you a letter from my family; I am in good health, as is also my daughter Bakhita, and her mother Umm es Shole. We send you greetings."

News was coming each day of the most alarming description for the Khaleefa; tales of big gunboats coming to reconnoitre Khartoum, and the "iron devil" (the railway) creeping forward, decided him on collecting everything under his eyes. All stores were hurried over to Omdurman; a hundred and fifty to two hundred men were sent over to destroy the mission house, mosque, and other buildings in Khartoum, as the Khaleefa was determined to leave no place of shelter for any troops who succeeded in landing there. I was looked upon with the greatest suspicion, as there was no concealing, try as I might, my anxiety to glean every bit of news possible about the expedition, and I was also in a fever of excitement expecting the return of Onoor. Each day was bristling with opportunities for escape, provided there was a man with a camel ready for me on the opposite