The 19th, 20th, and 21st of the moon, were employed in traversing the naked country before-mentioned, which is barren, rocky, and without cultivation.  We marched for three days, from the middle of the afternoon till midnight.  It was not till the second hour after midnight, however, of the third day, that we arrived at a country on the border of the Nile, containing several villages, where we remained till the middle of the afternoon of the 21st.  On our arrival at these villages, the darkness and severe hunger engaged several of the soldiers to take, by force, sheep and goats from the inhabitants.  The officers of the Pasha vigorously interposed to prevent this infraction of the orders of his Excellence, and several of the guilty were severely punished for taking forbidden means to gratify the demands of nature.

At the hour of afternoon prayer the signal was fired, and the camp proceeded onwards.  We left the villages afore-mentioned, and passed through a sandy tract covered with bushes and the thorny acacia, which embarrassed our march, and, by occasioning several detours, caused the army to lose its way.  After wandering about till midnight, the camp at length arrived on the bank of the Nile.

On the 22d, at the rising of the moon, the camp proceeded, and halted in the forenoon on the beach of the river, opposite Halfya, a very large village on the easterly bank.  We stayed here till the twenty-sixth to obtain durra from this territory, whose chief brought, as a present to the Pasha, some fine horses and many camels, and received, in return, some valuable presents.  Our side of the river is desert, and covered with trees and bushes.  During our stay opposite Halfya, the Nile, on the night of the 23d, rose suddenly about two feet, and inundated some parts of the sandy flats where we were encamped; the water entering the tents of several, my own among others, and wetting my bed, arms, and baggage.[46] It had risen a little shortly after the equinox, while the army was in Berber, and afterwards subsided more than it had risen.  We find the sky every day more and more overcast; distant thunder and lightning, accompanied with violent squalls, (which have overset my tent twice,) are, within a few days, frequent, and drops of rain have fallen in our camp.

On the 26th, at one hour after noon, we proceeded to the Bahar el Abiud, about five hours march above our present position, where the Pasha intends to cross into the territory of Sennaar.  The camp arrived at sunset at a position a little above where the Nile falls into the Bahar el Abiud, and stopped.  Immediately on my arrival, I drank of this river, being, probably, the first man of Frank origin that ever tasted its waters.

The Nile is not half as broad as the Bahar el Abiud, which is, from bank to bank, one mile higher than where the Nile joins it, about a mile and a quarter in breadth.  It comes, as far as we can see it, from the west-south-west.  The Nile of Bruce must, therefore, after the expedition of Ismael Pasha, be considered as a branch of a great and unexplored river, which may possibly be found to be connected with the Niger.