The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1903-06-05
CHAPTER Ii.

imagine the regulation householder -
Lover of Justice, Constant Reader, Pa
terfamilias and all that lot-frizzling
on hot gravelT'
with a blue veil over his head and
his clothes in strips. Has any man
here needle? I've got piece of sug-
ar sack"
"Ill lend you packing needle for
SIX square inches of it, then. Both my
knees are worn through"
"Why not six square acres while
you're about it? But lend me the nee
die, and I'll see what | can do with
the selvage. l don't think there's
enough to protect my royal body from
the cold blast as it is. What are you
doing with that everlasting sketchbook
of yours, Dick?"
"Study of our special correspondent
repairing his wardrobe" said Dick
gravely as the other man kicked off
pair of sorely worn riding breeches and
began to1fit a square of coarse canvas
over the most obvious open space. He
grunted disconsolately as the vastness
of the void Developed itself
sugar bags, indeed! geu22pilot
man there, Lend me all the sails or
that whaleboat."
A fez crowned head bobbed up in the
stern sheets, divided itself into exact
halves with one flashing grin and bob
bed down again. The man of the bat
tered breeches, clad only in Norfolk
jacket and a gray flannel shirt went
on with his clumsy sewing, while Dick
chuckled over his sketch.
Some twenty whalebOats were nuZ-
zling a sand bank which was dotted
with English soldiery of half dozen
corps, bathing or washing their clothes.
A heap of boat rollers, commissariat
boxes, sugar bags and -four and small
arm ammunition cases showed where
one of the whaleboats had been COM
PEELED to unload hastily, and a regi-
mental carpenter was swearing aloud
as he tried on a wholly insufficient al
lowance of white lead to plaster up the
sun parched gaping seams of the boat
herself.
"First the bloomin rudder snaps"
said he to the world in general; ''then
the mast goes, an then, s. 'elp me,
when she can't do nothin' else she
opens 'erself out like a cock eyed Chi
nese lotus.''
Exactly the case with my breaches,
whoever you are" said the tailor, with
out looking up. "Dick, wonder when
1 shall see decent shop again"
There was no answer save the inces-
SAINT angry murmur of the Nile as 1t
raced round Il basalt walled bend and
foamed across a rock ridge half mile
up stream. 1t was as though the
brown weight of the river would drive
the white men back to their own coun-
try The indescribable weight of the
Nile mud in the air told that the stream
was falling and that the next few miles
would be no light thing for the whale
boats to overpass.
The desert ran down almost to the
banks, where among gray, red and
black hillocks a camel corps was en-
camped No man dared, even for a
day, lose touch of the slow moving
boats. There had been no fighting for
weeks past, and throughout all that
time the Nile had never spared them.
Rapid had followed rapid, rock rock,
and island group island group, till the
rank and file had long since lost all
count of direction and very nearly Of
time. They were moving somewhere,
they did not know why, to do some
thing, they did not know what. Before
them lay the Nile, and at the other end
- f,~l,+ fn, dos IL
life, in q town called Khartum.
There We're columns of British troops
in the desert, or in one of the many
deserts; there were columns on the riv-
er; there were yet more columns wait
ing to embark ON the river; there We're
fresh drafts waiting at Assiut and AS
souan; there were lies and rumors run
ming over the face of the hopeless land
from Suakim to the Sixth cataract, and
men supposed generally that there must
be some one in authority to direct the
general scheme of the many move
ments. The duty of that particular
river column was to keep the whale
boats afloat in the water, to avoid
trampling on the villagers crops when
lines thrown from midstream, to get
as much sleep and food as was possible
and, above all, to press on without de-
lay in the teeth of the churning Nile.
With the soldiers sweated and toiled
the correspondents Of the newspapers.
and they were almost as ignorant as
their companions. But it was above
all things necessary that England at
breakfast should be amused and thrill
ed and interested, whether Gordon
lived or died or half the British army
went to pieces in the sands. The Su-
dan campaign was picturesque one
and lent itself to vivid word painting.
Now and again Special managed
to get slain-which was not altogether
a disadvantage to the paper that en-
ployed him-and more often the hand
10 hand nature of the fighting allowed
of miraculous escapes which were
worth telegraphing home at Is pence
the word. There were many CORE
spondents with many corps and col
umns, from the veterans who had fol
lowed on the heels of the cavalry thai
occupied Cairo in 1882 what time Arab
Pasha called himself king, who had
seen the first miserable work round
Suakim when the sentries were cut up