…the Nile is settled.
-John Hanning Speke, Telegram sent April 1863 from Khartoum to the Foreign Office, London
Speke and Grant, Burton and Baker, Petherick and his wife Katherine, they were all Answering Parties to the Question posed by the Royal Geographical Society, Whence the Nile? When we were watering the herd upstream from Dongola on Day 21, with Abdullah shampooing his hair, Rabih soaping himself through his Sirwal, Ibrahim filling the Qirbas and Hamid scrubbing the Aseeda pot, I didn’t think to ask KhairAllah, Min Wayn al-Bahr?, Whence the Sea?, as he called the Nile, for the answer was obvious. Allah Huwa Karīm Lil-‘Atshānīn wal-Mutarrabīn, God is Generous to the Thirsty and the Dust-Covered.