About twelve o’clock we see, on the right side of the river, six ostriches walking about. This sight Suliman Kashef cannot withstand. We go ashore therefore, but the ostriches do not seem to trust us strangers: they stride up the country, and run away, directly the first shot sounds in their ears. The shore here gently rises from ten to twelve feet; and the hill, which might once have counted many huts where now only a few cabins are seen, rose some six feet higher. Behind it, the whole surface of the earth falls away, and the Nile is seen at a distance flowing near other Dinka villages, and ending in a narrow channel, deep in the land. A number of potsherds lay around; and those small heights I had taken at a distance for ant-hills, as these had often come before me in the Taka country, were hills of ashes. The Dinkas, who here chiefly lead a pastoral life, make on these hills their fires, and raking away the warm ashes, and collecting them in a circular form, lie down and sleep upon them, on account of the damp nights, for they go naked like the Shilluks. The cattle also are tied to stakes, in a circle around these hills of ashes. Now I could explain the livid colour of the people; for no religious custom enjoins the strewing of ashes on the body; and washing is not one of their practices, as is only too plainly remarked by the slaves coming from thence. Opposite to us lay seven villages of the Shilluks. We had seen, at an earlier period, several of those Sürtuks (boats) erected within the shade of trees, in the country of the Shilluks; but here they are of an unusual length, and seem to be made of the dhellàb-palm. In the afternoon, level land abounded on all sides. We again approached the left shore. The stream flows in a picturesque semicircle before a beautiful pasture-ground, upon which are found doum and dhellèb-palms, mimosas, and other trees, forming a strong contrast to the blue sky. Between them eight villages are scattered, at which several people have collected under the protecting shade of two baobàbs, and gaze at us with astonishment. The Haba, or forest, either loses itself here, or extends beyond the horizon. Opposite, only one village, containing tokuls, with more pointed roofs, lies upon the arid ground; and a small river there seems to flow into the great stream, if it be not itself an arm of the river, having a considerable fall. We sail S.W., and make three miles whilst the river has the rapidity of one mile. On the right shore merely a doum-palm rises here and there from the immeasurable plain, whose low grey circumference, untouched by water, can scarcely be seen on account of the distance. At three o’clock five villages, in a low country, rich in palms; on the right shore, in front, only one village is to be seen, and the horizon before us is closed by nine villages. About four o’clock S.S.W.; on the left all flat to the forest, which again approaches nearer in an extensive sweep,