In the outer part of the valley, which is rather open, is a way into the Wadi Addattereh, where we had already been. It was a tremendous scramble to get up the gorge, and our tents were perched on rocks, and Matthaios was delighted with his nice clean kitchen in the middle of the gorge. He rigged up some sticks to hang a cloak up as a shade. The servants had plenty to do preserving antelopes and ibex heads, and burning charcoal and washing. We were here made glad by Captain Smyth's safe return, and after staying three days we returned to the mouth of our wadi, and then went on toward the north, and after five hours camped under some large trees near a well of very good water, called Tokwar. We finished our journey into the Wadi Koukout at 8 o'clock next morning, having to leave the camels and squeeze on on foot. It is a veritable frying-pan. We had hardly room to pitch our tents, or to get into them when pitched, by reason of the big boulders and steep hollows where water swirled about. There was good water quite close. We had another messenger from Sawakin, Hassan Gabrin, to guide us by land, or, if we went by sea, to say we should go quickly. The morning after our arrival we started very early to visit Koukout, a mountain really separate from Erba, but looking like a spur of it, the highest peak of which is only 4,000 feet above the sea. Here again one penetrates into the mountain by a curious gorge, with deep pools of water, the rocks about which are, if possible, more fantastic than those of Erba. One comes to chasms, over which the water flows, which look like the end of all things; but by climbing up the side of these one finds the gorge continuing until the very heart of the mountain is reached, where is a little open ground well stocked with water and green. High up here we spent a few hours at a pastoral village, where we found the women busily engaged in making butter in skins tied to a tree; these they shake until butter is produced. They store it in jars, and take it to Mohammed Gol to exchange for grain, but they eat very little except the products of their flocks, and, like the Abyssinians, they do not mind eating meat raw. We saw some interesting domestic features in this mountain village. The children are given toy shields and spears, with which to practise in early life; and we found here several long flutes with four notes each, the music of which is weird and not unlike that of the bagpipes, and well suited to the wild surroundings.