We Now Gave Him Stimulants; A Tea-Spoonful Of
Araki That We Had Bought At Fashoder Was Administered Every Ten Minutes
On A Lump Of Sugar.
This he crunched in his mouth, while he gazed at my
wife with an expression of affection, but he could not speak.
I had him
well washed and dressed in clean clothes, that had been kept most
carefully during the voyage, to be worn on our entree to Khartoum. He
was laid down to sleep upon a clean mat, and my wife gave him a lump of
sugar to moisten his mouth and relieve his thickly-furred tongue. His
pulse was very weak, and his skin cold. "Poor Saat," said my wife, "his
life hangs upon a thread. We must nurse him most carefully; should he
have a relapse, nothing will save him." An hour passed, and he slept.
Karka, the fat, good-natured slave woman, quietly went to his side:
gently taking him by the ankles and knees, she stretched his legs into a
straight position, and laid his arms parallel with his sides. She then
covered his face with a cloth, one of the few rags that we still
possessed. "Does he sleep still?" we asked. The tears ran down the
cheeks of the savage but good-hearted Karka, as she sobbed, "He is
dead!"
We stopped the boat. It was a sandy shore; the banks were high, and a
clump of mimosas grew above high water-mark. It was there that we dug
his grave.
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