"Passing by Kerrieri, we arrive at last at Khartoum, a town replete with bustle and movement, in the full tide of Turkish and African civilization, crowded with the countless vessels and boats of all sorts and sizes, which, at this time of the year, throng the port. In a few days, towards the middle of December, the navigation of the White Nile will become easy, and all the merchants of the country are hard rat work preparing their cargoes of European commodities for the south—silk, cotton, and woollen goods, muslins, powder, sugar, spices, coffee, and arrack—in exchange for the produce of equatorial countries, such as gum, gold dust, ostrich feathers, rhinoceros horns, hippopotamus and elephant's tusks, and last but not least, a goodly number of slaves, whom, in spite of the Government edicts, they know how to hide in some den and sell to a pacha or a bey, whose position places him out of the reach of the law. We must admit this fundamental principle—in Eastern countries nothing changes, old manners and customs are always more powerful than laws and firmans. The Turk is, so to speak, steeped in the past; he sometimes is subject to superficial reform, but he soon returns to his former errors, and stagnates afresh in his ancient traditions. "I promised to take you as far as Khartoum, and I have kept my promise. I will not, however, limit you to your pound of flesh, but, before taking leave of you, perhaps, for some time, I will give you a few concise notes about this town, curious in more ways than one. These notes are indispensable to you, if you really take any interest in our journey and wish to follow our onward course. A little patience, and Périères and Delange will take you for a walk through this wonderful place, and will unfold to you its secrets; for, so I am told, there is a truly marvellous freedom of morals in Khartoum, and in it the scent of European corruption mingles with the acrid stench of savage life.