The white navigators alluded to are evidently the expeditionists who were sent by Mehemet Ali, Viceroy of Egypt, up the White Nile as far as Gondokoro, about twelve or fourteen years ago, and the Nile and lake have been confounded as one water in the transmission of the intelligence, though both were seen. The minds of the Kurrum people seemed greatly discomposed about various rumours which they heard. One was that the English intended to suppress the slave-trade, and they wished me to tell them if such was not a fact--saying it would be unjust for us to do so, as slaving was an acknowledged right given them in the Koran, and handed down by their Russool Mahamed. The other bugbear which alarmed them was a report that the English intended either to take possession of Berbera, or that they would give it to Shermarky--a native chief and ally of ours who lives at Zeylah. In short, these numerous fears arose from Herne's long residence at Berbera. It looked suspicious seeing him take notes there of everything, and they naturally put the worst interpretation on all his actions. What could be the use of his watching the trade, if our Government did not want to take the country?--of watching the slave-trade, if it did not mean stopping it? And then the suppression of Abbanships was the crowning of all. The village of Kurrum consisted of a single fort and a large collection of mat huts, all grouped together, situated close to the shore. The maritime plain consisted of sandy-brown soil, very uninteresting, with scarcely any vegetation growing on it, and was here only about half a mile broad. The hills in the background were very insignificant, not half so high as any I had seen, and were dull and brown, like those one sees when travelling down the Red Sea. The people say that in their recesses and ravines acacias and other gum-trees grow as they do elsewhere. Gum only exudes in the dry hot season; and the confined air in the ravines is described as being so hot that people can hardly stay there, and many of the gum-pickers who do, become deaf in consequence of it. The water which the villagers used was so brackish as to be hardly drinkable. I lived here five days, enjoying sour camel's milk, gossiping with the natives, and roaming about the place. The difference between the life I was now living, attributable principally to the sagacity and good-heartedness of the Balyuz, was a charming contrast to my wretched existence when with the Warsingali. I bought twenty-five camels, at an average rate of five and a half dollars a-head, and then stopped purchasing, as I heard by letter from Herne he had then got nearly sufficient for our requirements--that camels were very plentiful at Berbera, and he was buying them at a cheaper rate than I could.