The name Sudan is short for Beled-es-Sudan, which means the Land of the Blacks. Extending from the southern frontier of Egypt to Uganda, a distance equal to that from Saint Paul to New Orleans, and from the shores of the Red Sea to the confines of the great central African kingdom of Wadai, or as far as from Chicago to Denver, the Sudan boasts an area three times that of Texas. This area, prior to the Dervish oppression, had a population estimated at eight and a half millions, but, as a result of the wholesale massacres perpetrated by the Mahdi and his followers, it has to-day less than two and a half millions. Since the return of peace, however, the Sudan is gradually recovering from the effects of the Dervishes' barbaric rule, during which the whole country was depopulated, wide tracts of land went out of cultivation, and trade was largely abandoned. At present the poverty, the scanty population, and the lack of irrigation in the Sudan form a striking contrast to the wealth, the density of population, and the high state of cultivation found in Egypt. But, though it has been, until very recently, little better than an abandoned estate, with practically no market value, the money and labour which its British proprietors are expending upon it are already beginning to produce highly promising results. As a matter of fact, the agricultural resources of this inland empire are hardly guessed at, for the fact is too apt to be overlooked that, beyond the sandy deserts which guard its northern frontier, there exist extensive and fertile regions which, in the provinces of Gezire and Sennar alone, are estimated at fifteen millions of acres. Added to this, the Sudan is particularly fortunate in possessing, in the Blue and the White Nile, two great waterways which are destined to prove invaluable as mediums of fertilisation and transportation. There is, indeed, no room for doubt that the Sudan is destined to be in time a great agricultural centre, for cotton, wheat, and sugar-cane are staple and give every promise of prolific crops—many English experts prophesying that, when provided with facilities for irrigation, it will supplant the United States as the chief cotton-growing country of the world—while, farther afield, there are excellent cattle ranges and untold wealth in forest lands. But although much money has already been spent upon the Sudan, much more will have to be spent before it can have more than a speaking acquaintance with prosperity, for none of its three great needs—population, irrigation, and transportation—can be provided for nothing or in a hurry. [Illustration: Fighting-men of the Emir of Wadai. (“They are wearing helmets and chain mail captured by their Saracenic ancestors from the Crusaders. The quilted armour on the horses will turn anything short of a bullet.”)