The next day we marched to Khor Katout, a big ravine in the plain of the Atbara, which extends to the river. A hot wind had again arisen, and was carrying quantities of dust with it. The journey was exceedingly unpleasant, and coolness was nowhere to be found. Khor Katout is a well-known haunt of lions, and we heard them roaring in the night. On March 10 we arrived at the point where the road from Gedaref to Kassala joins that on which we were travelling. Here there is a “nocter”—a military post, where five soldiers are stationed. At this place we found a rest-hut, in which we took shelter till three in the afternoon, and then marched on till six, covering about nine miles in the three hours. Since we had left the course of the Atbara we had been obliged to send to the river for water. It was brought in the “fantassis.”[115] This necessity delayed us, and added to the petty troubles of the journey, but we expected to reach the river bed again on the next day. That night my sleeping-place in the open was within three or four yards of the track, and the moon was very bright. It was a most characteristic Eastern sight, when, about nine o’clock, some thirty camels passed along the route at the foot of my bed, slowly and silently. They carried no loads, and were probably returning from Kassala to Gedaref. On the following day, as we marched, we saw spoor of lions and leopards among the mingled traces of hyenas, jackals, and many antelopes. We camped for the night at a very lonely spot on the Atbara which is called Khashim el Girba.[116] Here the river emerges from a narrow, deep, rocky gorge where the width of its course in places does not exceed one hundred and twenty feet. The steep sides have been smoothed by the terrific rush of water in the rainy season. One of the pools in the bed of this cataract is very large, and uniformly deep. I noticed that earth had lodged behind rocks which jutted from the sides of the gorge, and a growth of mimosa scrub had established itself even in the shallow soil on these ledges. There is no village at Khashim el Girba, but it is a recognized camping-ground. Beyond the narrows the Atbara broadens to a width of half a mile, and its course is divided by an island. Here, at the time of our visit, one could wade across the river bed through a stream which reached the ankles. The scene must be one of singular beauty and grandeur when the floods are coming down from Abyssinia. We heard a lion roaring at night, and there are numbers around this place, but they had plenty of game to prey upon and did not approach the camp.