to In the same year the colonists needed supplies so urgently that the Governor was "through their entreating" induced to return England. Before he could return with the said supplies the Spanish War had broken out, and not until 1591 was Governor White able to return, bringing succour to the seemingly deserted little band. In Manteo there is one Christian prince," he landed place for the accommodation here, after several other of man- and beast! It is unavailing attempts, one called, most inappropriately, hundred men and seventeen Tranquil House, and its front women, with John White as yard boasts one of the few Governor. historical sights to be seen on sleepy Roanoke-a mound of cobble-stones. These, the natives tell you, are part of the ballast from Raleigh's ships. This particular pile was brought from what is called Ballast Point, where they lay half-submerged in the surf. Search as you will for hundreds of miles hereabouts, you can find no such stones as these. All of them are festooned with barnacles and oyster - shells, and indicate plainly that they have lain for centuries in salt water and marsh mud. Several authorities state that one or more of the ships bringing the colonists were obliged to throw out their stone ballast in order to get up the narrow inlets of Roanoke Island and vicinity. Few Englishmen (or white men, I imagine) can look outward from Manteo to the impenetrable forest on one side, and the great stretch of ocean on the other, without the history of poor beheaded Raleigh, and particularly his Roanoke expedition, recurring to them with peculiar pathos, seen from the identical spot where its inception began. After Queen Elizabeth granted to Sir Walter Raleigh a patent "to discover, searche, finde out and view suche view suche remote, heathen, and barbarous lands and terretories not actually possessed of any to "We let fall our Grapnel," wrote White, "very neere the shore & sounded with a trumpet a call, & afterwards many familiar English tunes and songs, and called to them friendly: but no answer." Next day the relief party landed, and, according White: "Upon a tree were curiously carved these Roman letters C.R.O., which we knew to signify the place we should 'find the planters seated,' as we had agreed before my departure. I willed that should they be distressed in any of those places they should carve over the letters a cross, but we found no such sign of distress. . . We passed to their houses, but found them taken down, and palisaded very stout, and very fort-like. One of the chief trees at the right of the entrance had the bark taken off, and five feet from the ground in fair capital letters was graven 'CROATOAN' without any cross or sign of distress. I greatly joyed that I had found a token of their safe being at Croatoan, which is the place where Manteo ('the baptised chief') was born, and the savages of the islands our friends.' Bad weather immediately set in, an anchor was lost, and the expedition itself narrowly escaped shipwreck. So, believing the colonists safe, White (whose own daughter was among the settlers) at once set sail set sail in search of Spanish prizes, intending to return in the spring-time. But he never came back,and from that day to this the one carven word "Croatoan" is the only sign left by the first-planted colony in North America. Despite all legends of "Hatteras Indians with blue eyes and auburn hair, who boasted that their ancestors could talk in a book," it was not until the eighteenth century that the Croatan Indians-now settled in Robeson County and Raleigh's vanished colony were recognised as one and the same. Link by link the chain was connected, and now Englishmen (and their American cousins, too) are pleased to know that the gray-eyed Croatans, with their old-style English speech and cross-bow weapons," are acknowledged as a separate race in North Carolina, with separate schools and separate school fund. This is due to the efforts of a Mr M'Millan (whose name speaks for itself!), who worked for years to remove the suspicion that because these people were dark of skin they were negroes, and to secure for them the rights to which they, as native Indian tribes, at least are entitled! G. CUNNINGHAM TERRY. FROM THE OUTPOSTS. CAMEL CORPS I. LOOK at any old map of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, and to the south-west of Khartoum you will find the province of Kordofan, studded with the names of places which have played their part in the history of the country, but now in many cases are but a name. The traveller in his search passes unconsciously places shown in big, large letters on his out-of-date map, names which were studied by the Intelligence Departments of more than one European nation in the days when the country was one big unapproachable mystery Melbis, Shekan, Foga, Birket, and others. Some have disappeared through their supply of water giving some unaccountable way; others, like Shekan, where a thirsty British-commanded force was totally destroyed and wiped out of existence, loomed largely on the maps of an absent world, but to the inhabitants were little known. Here in this almost fertile and healthy part of the Sudan the Mahdi gathered his strength by a succession of victories at Bara and El Obeid, before sweeping down with the fanatical horde of the country to Omdurman, and on to the crushing of the defender of Khartoum. Troublesome times they were, as the out in MANEUVRES. old Archway Tower with its many cannon-ball holes testifies at El Obeid, as do the cannonballs themselves, for they still lie half-hidden scattered about in the sand, and men show the marks of lashes received by the Mahdi's underlings. Under a new and just Government the people have settled down into happy contented ways. But amongst people who have lived by the sword for generations, the short space of ten or fifteen years, even under the most just of Governments, does not quite suffice for peace. Now and again misguided individuals crop up to lead the banner of rebellion against everything that tends to prosperity. Following in the steps of the Mahdi, occasional self-proclaimed prophets have crossed from the eastern bank of the Nile to declare themselves the true prophet to the wild believing nomad Arabs of Kordofan. To maintain peace and uphold the working of a Government which yearly brings increased prosperity to the country, is the work of the Camel Corps. There may be others its equal, but for loyalty, hard work, and an uncomplaining spirit under difficulties, it is not excelled, and its discipline on patrol is of the strictest. Many people have heard of this small self-contained force, but few except those that have come into close contact with it on patrol understand its workings, its independence, and its self-reliance. No force could be more self-contained. Under a succession of keen, broadminded commanders it has gone on since the days of the Expedition from step to step, each new commander taking on the work where his predecessor left off, sifting out good methods from bad, learning from the experiences and mistakes of those that have commanded before, gradually working up a spirit of esprit de corps that is unrivalled in its influence for good. The wild Arab is proud. Taken as he comes to "The Hagana" untamed, and supremely self-possessed, he learns the rigid rules of discipline of his own free will, and gradually with it all becomes a real fighting unit, much to be reckoned with, who thinks his corps is unbeatable, and his company the best of his corps. Of the latter he is convinced. The Camel Corps has been fortunate in its commanders, men who have trusted their subordinates, subordinates who have done their best to be trusted, working under a divided responsibility, the guiding reins being at El Obeid long reins, for the field of operations is wide. The corps consists of a commanding officer, a second-incommand, and five companies, each under its British officer, with five native or Arab officers, and each a hundred and fifty mounted soldiers strong. Every man with his camel is a responsible fighting unit, carrying on his animal his equipment, his rifle and three hundred rounds of ammunition, seven days' forage for his camel and water inside the animal for the same time, his clothes and blankets and cooking material, and water for three to seven days for himself as the occasion demands, and food for six weeks in his native - tanned bread skin. Equipped like this, a company will turn out at three or four hours' notice, trot off west into the darkness, and remain away for weeks at a time, a compact self-contained fighting force to be dreaded and reckoned with, in a country where water is always the want, and large bodies of troops cannot move without many previous preparations. Each Bimbashi commanding a company is responsible for its efficiency for active service and patrol work direct to the Commandant, independently of any other company, and the five separate units vie with one another in the healthiest and most generous of competitions for the greatest efficiency: the height to be reached is detailed by the Commandant from his headquarters; the manner of reaching it is left, with the exception of a few broad guiding directions, to the O.C. Company, and in this lies the secret of the efficiency. 1 The Hagana=Camel Corps. Responsibility is divided, there is everything that and independence of thought leader could want: an indeand methods is created. pendent, loyal, and reliable In the companies themselves command-men who, though decentralisation is the key- strung out one behind the note, and the methods loose other on the narrow sandy and open, but the chain of track for a mile or more, could responsibility from the lowest form square with rapidity at upwards is held by the the sound of a bugle, loving strictest of discipline, and the the work, each one his own fire discipline is good. Little ammunition-supply, his waterparties of men move off from carrier, and his quartermaster. their headquarters to carry No transport and no worrying out the duties specified to issuing of rations-just one them, perhaps being away for hundred and fifty dependable weeks at a time without di- fighting units, born to the rect supervision, their leaders work, who always seem to carrying out the Camel Corps rise to difficulties and back methods of trekking, and con- one up loyally. trolling their parties, as if the responsibilities of the Officer Commanding the Hagana rested on their shoulders. Bravely they look as they trot along some narrow sandy sandy track, ready for any emergency. Often I have sat on a roan Gebel pony and watched a company filing silently past by night, the nodding ostrich plumes in their Emmas1 showing up against a rising moon, with nothing to be heard except the soft pad pad on the sand, or the low crooning of some Arab songster dying away towards the head of the column. Camel after camel passes in single file, with the rifle barrel resting on the rider's knee, glistening in the moonlight. Then, though one might be in a thirsty and little known and perhaps hostile country, travelling at night far out of touch from all communications, under one's hand Many stories could one tell after six years' work with them to illustrate their loyalty and faithfulness in backing up the British officers, whom they have trekked and lived with in desert and forest camps. Perhaps the influence is mostly personal, but what else can be expected from a race untrammelled by discipline, where the son marries at an early age, and the youth is a warrior in his teens, and all want to lead and not be led. There are black sheepthere always are-but these are quickly weeded out, as the officer commanding a company, with the approval of the Commandant, can enlist and discharge as he pleases. But when a man has passed through the ordeal of subordinating his wild, free-born ways to the rules of discipline, and survived to his second period of service- to his fourth |