Page:H. D. Traill - From Cairo to the Soudan Frontier.djvu/120

The Beshereens, who are to figure in the first event of the day, belong to a race which is only sparsely represented among the spectators; but it is doubtful whether the local methods of coercion could be very hopefully tried on them. There is hardly a greater difference between the hound and the hare than there is between this spirited son of the Nubian desert and the fellah of the Nile Valley. Lithe, shiny, jet black, nearly naked, his woolly hair twisted into unwilling plaits, bright-eyed, with teeth of dazzling whiteness, and an alert animated air which contrasts strongly with the dull, meek expression of the Egyptian and Egyptianised Arab, the Beshereen, as we view him side by side with the lighter-skinned and more heavily draped races around him, looks as if he might indeed have sat for that "Fuzzy Wuzzy" who earned name and benediction from Mr. Rudyard Kipling, as the only naked warrior who ever "bruk a British square." From his fantastic top-knot to the