Page:H. D. Traill - From Cairo to the Soudan Frontier.djvu/160

142 it so easily, even as it was, if it hadn't been for the fraternal assistance of brother Mohammed."

"Ahmed was game, was he?"

"As a pebble. The Mudir of Keneh had him under lock and key for weeks, and subjected him to a most severe interrogation. Ahmed still points with pride to the record of it on the soles of his feet. But they never got anything out of him. That was in the summer of 1880, and in the winter of that year his elder brother stepped round to the Mudirate, and, if you will excuse an Arabic expression, 'blew the gaff.' Then, as we all know, M. Maspero took the matter in hand, and Brugsch Bey made his expedition to the spot in the sweltering July heats of 1881 and — but why inflict guide-book upon you? Every one has read the famous Egyptologist's graphic account of this most stupendous of all archæological 'finds'—how he made his way along the passage from the bottom of the shaft pointed out to him by the reluctant