10th.—Did not sleep very well, and felt very cold during the night. But as soon as the sun is up it is hot. Such is The Desert. It is also cold in the shade, and hot in the sun. When riding, a hot wind burns the one cheek, and a cold wind blanches the other cheek[100]. You wander through these extremes like the spirits of the nethermost regions,—

"And feel by turns the bitter change Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce: From beds of raging fire, to starve in ice— Thence hurried back to fire."

I usually am obliged to wear my cloak out of the sun, besides a woollen burnouse.

Visited the marabet, or mausoleum, of Sidi Bou Salah, about two hundred paces from the large spring. My Fezzanee guide told me the daughter of the buried Marabout was still living in the oasis, but his sons were residing in Fezzan. When the corn was reaped, late in the spring, he himself should return to Fezzan. One or two persons would remain here. The tomb of the Marabout is enclosed within the usual square little house, having a dome or cupola roof, but it is not clean whitewashed, as these sanctuaries generally are on the Coast. On the tomb is a coverlet of particoloured and showy silks. The room of the mausoleum is snug and clean. A little lamp is kept burning at the head during the night. This is a sort of perpetual fire. There are two or three outhouses, or rooms, adjoining, in which, if anything be deposited, it is quite safe, it is sacred, no robbers in these wild countries being bold enough to commit such a sacrilege against the God of the Islamites. The entire oasis is peculiarly protected by the halo of the awful Marabout here buried. It is a place of perfect security for all travellers. In this way the sentiment of religion confers its advantages, whatever may be the creed of its professors. No doubt the sentiment of religion, as connected with superstition, inflicts upon mankind intolerable evils; but here, at any rate, is some compensation.

I surveyed again the great thermal spring. The water issues from a rocky ferruginous soil of iron ore, giving the water a mineral taste. Yet it is of the best quality. Apparently the water descends from the neighbouring mountain chains, and collects here, but its flow or stream is perennial. From this little eminence I had a panoramic view of the country, and was gratefully affected with the beautiful situation of the oasis. In the hands of Europeans, a city would be created here, one of the largest of The Great Desert, for water abounds on every side. This oasis would become the centre of a dense population, fed from the products of the soil. A mart of commerce would concentrate a great Saharan traffic, ramifying through every part of Africa. But what can be expected from people whose one predominant and quasi-religious idea teaches them that everything should remain as it is; as it was before so shall it be hereafter. People nevertheless pretend that political causes keep the oasis in its present miserable condition. Serdalas belongs to the Touaricks, who let it out to the Fezzaneers, but will not permit them to plant date-palms, lest the oasis should flourish and rival Ghat, and so injure that mart of commerce. Be it as it may, man always fails of his work, and if he does so in the more genial climes of Europe, what can come of his idleness and his improvidence in The Vast African Desert? Desolate as The Sahara may be in its essential character, it is rendered still more so by the neglect of its heedless and dreamy tenants. Many are the oases in this neglected, abandoned state. And the saddening, sickening thought often recurs to me, that, however desolate The Sahara may have been in past ages, it is now getting worse instead of better. Ghadames, and many oases of Fezzan, are dwindling away to nothing, the population lessening, and dispersing under the curse of the Turkish system!

Fezzan is only reckoned five days from Serdalas, good travelling, but, with a caravan of slaves, it will occupy us six or seven days. How fond of lying are the Moors, or, shall we say, boasting? The Shereef, I hear from my other companions, is not going on a pilgrimage to Mecca, as he boasted to me. He merely goes to Tripoli on a trip to sell his three slaves for the Governor, his uncle, and purchase a little merchandise in return.

Had a visit from the daughter of the Marabout, the wild Sybil of The Desert. She is an Arab lady of some seventy or more years of age, but, like most ladies, does not know how old she is. At first sight of her, I

"Gaz'd on her sun-burnt face with silent awe, Her tatter'd mantle, Her moving lips,—

"Whose dark eyes flash'd, through locks of blackest shade."

The Pythoness asked me how I liked her country, a hundred times, and then begged for something in the name of Allah. She kept saying, "What have you got for the daughter of the great Marabout?" "What have you got for her who dedicates her life to God?" She was very proud of the distinction, Bent-El-Marabout ("daughter of the Marabout"). And why should she not be proud? When all comes to all, the Saharan lady is as good as a Roman Nepote of the Pope. She continued, "What have you got for the daughter of the great Marabout?" And, indeed, I had got very little. I then gave her a little looking-glass, the only one I had. But this is no privation in The Desert, however necessary elsewhere. The looking-glass exceedingly delighted the sybil, for in it she saw the stern features of her face, with her dauntless eye. She then got familiar. She wondered why I was not married, and how I could go to sleep without a wife. She prayed me to take one from Fezzan, or buy a negress of the caravan, telling the people, "The Christian is very good, but very foolish. The Christian has plenty of money, and does not buy a wife." I told her it was prohibited to buy slaves. And as to a wife, I could not carry her about in The Desert. To which she at length, after much persuasion, consented to agree. The daughter of the Marabout showed no hostility against me as a Christian, although of such pure blood, and in which the antagonism of the eastern to the western spirit is supposed to be stronger. She gave me her blessing, and we parted friends. The only piece of dress of any kind which the Maraboutess wore was a thick, dark, woollen frock, with short sleeves. She had no ornaments; her hair was black, mixed with grey, long, and dishevelled about her neck and shoulders. An air of the Pythoness overshadows the countenance and carriage of this Desert priestess. Amongst the people she is a holy being. She lives alone. She has the power of foretelling future events. She receives small presents from all the ghafalahs which visit the oasis, as tithes of the Marabout shrine. She never leaves this Desert spot. Her person was ever inviolable. It is related that, many years ago, an Arab once attempted to surprise her in the night, and share a part of her bed, but was immediately struck dead before he could stretch out his hand to open the door of her grass-built hut. So The Desert has its incorruptible vestals. But the conversation which her ladyship had with me was all pro-matrimonial, and would not have suggested to the stranger that she was an ancient maiden of inviolate chastity. Perhaps she might have thought this sort of conversation would please me best. The Maraboutess, as well as the few Fezzaneers in Serdalas, are of short stature, of a very dark-brown complexion, approaching nearly to black, and some have the broad distended nostrils of the negro. The Shereef said to me this afternoon, "I'm going to pray at the Marabout shrine; I go happily, I return happily." Our Shereef is a little self-righteous.

Evening, died a young female slave. She had been ill a month. She was of the most delicate frame, and cost seventy dollars as a great beauty. She was buried in the grave-yard of the Marabet without any ceremonies. Happy creature to have so died. They first tried to dig a grave in open desert, but not succeeding, they carried her to the burial-ground of the Marabet.

11th.—To-day is the fourteenth day of the month, and Wednesday instead of Monday, by the reckoning of my fellow travellers. A fine morning, but we all felt severe cold during the past night, and which nipped up the poor slaves.

This morning visited Haj Ibrahim early, and seeing a young female very ill I remarked: "You had better leave her with the daughter of the Marabout." He replied, much agitated, "Oh, no, it's a she-devil." Thinking she might be sulky, as Negroes often sulk, I made no other observation. A few minutes after I heard the noise of whipping, and turning round, to my great surprise, I saw the Haj beating her not very mercifully. He had a whip of bull's hide with which he gave her several lashes. This displeased me much, for I thought if the girl had sulked a little she might have been cured without recourse to the whip, in her debilitated state. About a quarter of an hour afterwards, or not so much, I saw Haj Omer, servant of the Haj, going towards the graveyard, with a small ax in his hand, and suspecting something had happened, I followed to see what it was. On arriving at the Marabet, I asked,

"What are you going to do?"

"Dig a grave, only," was the reply.

"What," I continued, "are you going to dig the grave of the Negress whom Haj Ibrahim was just now beating?"

"Yes," Omer returned, greatly ashamed.

I was not surprised at the answer, but a disagreeable chill came over me. Omer then added apologetically, "They bring these poor creatures by force, they steal them. They give them nothing to eat but hasheesh (herbs). Her stomach is swollen. We couldn't cure her; Haj Ibrahim beat her to cure her. She had diarrha." This requires no comment. I add only, if Haj Ibrahim, who is a good master, can treat his slaves thus, what may we not expect from others less humane? There is no doubt but that the whipping of this poor creature hastened her death. She was, indeed, whipped at the point of death. I stopped to see the lacerated slave buried. She was some eleven years of age, and of frailest form. A grave was dug for her about fifteen inches deep and ten wide. It is fortunate there are no hyenas or chacalls to scratch up these bodies. They do "rest in peace." Into this narrow crib of earth she was thrust down, resting on her right side, with her head towards the south, and her face towards the east, or towards Mecca. She had on a small chemise, and her head and feet and loins were wrapped round with a frock of tattered black Soudan cotton. Omer, before he put her in, felt her breast to see if she were really dead. At first he seemed to doubt it, and fancied he felt her heart beating, but at last he made up his mind that she was really dead. I felt her hands. They were deathly cold. At times Moors bury people warm, and not unfrequently alive. They are always in a desperate hurry to get corpses under ground, thinking the soul cannot have any peace whilst the body lies unburied. As the last service to the body, Omer took some earth and stopped up her nostrils. This was done to prevent her reviving should she be not really dead, and attempt to move. Unquestionably if buried in the open desert, it is a service, for the wretch only revives to die a more horrible death. Some small flag-stones were then laid over the narrow cell, and these were covered with earth, in the form of a common grave, being only a little narrower than our graves, as the body is turned up on its side. The two poor young things lay side by side, the one who died yesterday, and the one to-day, giving their liberated spirits opportunity to return to the loved land of freedom, the wild woods of the Niger. Happy beings were they;—better to die so in The Desert, in the morning of their bondage, than live to minister to the corrupt appetites of the unfeeling sensualist! Seeing others, free people, with pieces of stone raised up at their heads, and wishing the slave and the free to have equal rights in the grave, I fetched two pieces of stone and placed them at their heads likewise. If it be permitted to pray for the dead, God save, in mercy, these two youthful, frail, but almost sinless souls!

DIRGE[101].

"O'er her toil-wither'd limbs sickly languors were shed, And the dark mists of death on her eyelids were spread; Before her last sufferings how glad did she bend, For the strong arm of death was the arm of a friend.

"Against the hot breezes hard struggled her breast, Slow, slow beat her heart, as she hastened to rest; No more shall sharp anguish her faint bosom rend, For the strong arm of death was the arm of a friend.

"No more shall she sink in the deep scorching air, No more shall keen hunger her weak body tear; No more on her limbs shall swift lashes descend, For the strong arm of death was the arm of a friend.

"Ye ruffians! who tore her from all she held dear, Who mock'd at her wailings and smil'd at her tear; Now, now she'll escape, every suffering shall end, For the strong arm of death was the arm of a friend."

I returned to the encampment and found the caravan in motion. Burning hot to-day. I felt the heat as oppressive as in my journey of August to Ghadames. Fortunately our faces were north-east, away from the sun in its greatest power. No one can understand this passage, , (Rev. i. 16,) who has not travelled under the influence of the Saharan sun. The rays dart down with a peculiar fierceness upon your devoted head, depriving you of all your life-springs. As to its splendour, the eye of the eagle turns away daunted from its all-effulgent beams. Since leaving Ghat we have passed many graves of the "bond and the free," who have died in open desert. Passed one to-day, with Arabic characters carved on the stone raised at its head. Passed by also several desert mosques, which are simply the outline in small stones, of the ground-plan of Mahometan temples.

We have, in many instances, only the floor of the mosque marked out, or rather the walls which inclose the floor. Within the outlines the stones are nicely cleared away. Here the devout passers-by occasionally stop and pray. The desert mosques are some of them of these shapes—



The places projecting in squares or recesses are the kiblah, upon which the Faithful prostrate themselves towards the east, or Mecca[102].

Our course is through an undulating country of hills and valleys. We made a short day, for we began to fear we might lose many of the slaves. A Touarghee caravan, going to Fezzan, overtook us en route, but soon turned off to the north-west.

FOOTNOTES:

[96] I hope I offered up a heartfelt prayer of thankfulness to the Almighty for my deliverance from perishing in The Desert.

[97] It is a very wide valley, nay an extensive plain. But the Doctor writes about it before he arrives there.

[98] Tholh——Acacia gummifera, (Willd.) It bears what the Moors and Arabs call Smug Elârab ( ), or "Gum Arabic." This is the most hardy tree of The Desert, and, like the karub-trees of Malta, strikes its roots into the very stones.

[99] Dr. Oudney says, who was a man of science:—"Rain sometimes falls in the valley (of Sherkee, Fezzan,) sufficient to overflow the surface and form mountain torrents. But it has no regular periods, five, eight, and nine years frequently intervening between each time. Thus, no trust can be placed in the occurrence of rain, and no application made in agricultural concerns." In truth, the rain which falls in these uncertain intervals, seems to answer no available purpose, unless to feed the wells and under-currents of water.

[100] The blowing hot and cold with the same breath is here a reality, or thereabouts.

[101] Adapted from an anonymous piece, called "The Dying Negro."

[102] "But we will cause thee to turn towards a Kiblah that will please thee. Turn, therefore, thy face towards the holy temple of Mecca; and wherever ye be, turn your faces towards that place."—Surat ii.



CHAPTER XXIV.

FROM GHAT TO MOURZUK.

Another Range of Black Mountains.—Habits of She-Camels when having Foals.—Our Mahrys.—Intelligence of my Nagah.—Geology of Route.—Arrive at the Boundaries of Ghat and Fezzan.—The Moon-Stroke.—Sudden Tempest.—Theological Controversy of The Shereef.—Wars and Razzias between the Tibboos and Touaricks.—Forests of Tholh Trees.—The Shereef's opinion of the Touaricks.—Dine with The Shereef.—Saharan Travellers badly clothed and fed.—Style of making Bazeen.—Mode of Encamping.—Cold Day, felt by all the Caravan.—Well of Teenabunda.—Arrival in The Wady of Fezzan.—Meeting of the two Slave Caravans.—Tombs of Ancient Christians.—Routes between Ghat and Fezzan.—Weariness of Saharan Travel.—Oases and Palms of The Wady.—We meet a rude Sheikh, demanding Custom-Dues.—Haj Ibrahim's opinion of the Virgin Mary.—Black Jews in Central Africa.—My Affray with the Egyptian.—Route to Tripoli, viâ Shaty and Mizdah.—Features and Colour of Fezzaneers.—My Journey from The Wady to Mourzuk, on leaving the Slave-Caravans.—Tombs of former Inhabitants, and Legends about them.—Bleak and Black Plateau.—The Targhee Scout.—Have a Bilious Attack.—Desert Arcadians, and lone Shepherdesses.—Oasis of Agath, and its want of Hospitality.

12th.—A LONG, long, weary day, and tormentingly hot in the middle of the day. Course north-east, over plains scattered with small stones. Traversed a few small ridges of hills. A new species of stone to-day, the hard slate-coloured, and some of it with a granite-like look. Afternoon, came in sight of the other chain of black, or, as sometimes designated, Soudan mountains, stretching boundlessly north and south, like those near Ghat. This chain likewise extends to the Tibboo country. It is an error of some of the late French writers, to make the Saharan ranges always run east and west. This direction of development only applies to the Atlas ranges of the Coast. No trees, and no herbage for the camels. The hasheesh which the camels ate this evening was brought us from the encampment of yesterday. The poor slaves knocked up to-day; rested many times on the road, and another very ill. In all probability she will follow her companions lately dead. Others, however, sang and danced, and tried to forget their slavery and hardships. But the death of the two girls is a damper for the rest, and they have not been so merry since that mournful occurrence. The she-camels, which have foals, give no milk for want of herbage. The two mothers bite one another's children. This, perhaps, they do to teach the young ones their true mothers. One of them makes a great noise over her young one, and disturbs all the caravan. Evening, whilst all the people were at prayers, and prostrating in their usual parallel lines, I went up to her, and began teazing her. The angry brute slowly and deliberately got up, but, once on her legs, she made a dead set at me, running after me. Meanwhile, receding backwards as fast as I could, I fell over some of the people praying and prostrating, and the camel attacked them as well as me, spoiling their devotions. The camel now returned to her foal; and, prayers over, Haj Ibrahim said to me, laughing, "Yâkob, the camel knows you are a kafer, and don't pray with us. So she attacks you. Camels never attack good Moslems at their prayers." The foal of seven days' old walked the whole of our long march to-day! and nearly as fast as a man. So the poor camel begins to learn by times its lessons of patience and long-suffering. The mahry of the Haj is very vicious and greedy, and bites all the other camels which eat with it. Camels are made to eat in a circle, all kneeling down, head to head, and eye to eye. Within this circle of heads is thrown the fodder. Each camel claims its place and portion, eating that directly opposite to its head. The people eat in the same manner in circles, each claiming the portion before them, but squatting on their hams instead of kneeling. The mahry of the Haj is quite white, and is a very fine animal; but its eye is small and sleepy-looking, so that it does not appear to have the amount of intelligence of the Coast camels. We have another smaller mahry, and some of the mahrys are as diminutive as others are gigantic in size. My nagah feeds by herself. The males never bite the females as they bite one another,—a piece of admirable gallantry, so far, on their part, but they rob the females of their fodder, and I am obliged constantly to keep driving them away from my nagah. The nagah knows she receives her dates from our panniers. Stooping down on one of them this evening to find something, putting my head right in, and raising myself up, I found the nagah's head right over my shoulder, attentively watching me, to see if I was bringing out her dates. She distinguishes me well from the Moors and Arabs, by my black cloak, and is usually very gentle and civil to me, and familiar, more especially about the time of bringing out the dates.

13th.—Our course north-east, over an undulating plain of sand and gravel, and at intervals the desert surface was a plain pavement of stone, of a dark slate-colour. Greater part of the route strewn with pieces of petrified wood, but no pretty fossil remains. Wood, apparently chumps of the tholh. We had all day the new range of black mountains on our right, which extend southwards far beyond the Fezzanee country to the Tibboos. Intensely cold all day, the air misty, and the wind from north-west. But I prefer this cold to the heat of yesterday. Haj Ibrahim complained of the cold, and was alarmed for his slaves. One of the females he chased on his mahry, the girl running away on foot, and gave her two or three cuts with the whip. She had been accused of too great familiarity with a male slave. Crime and slavery go hand in hand: Miserable humanity!

About noon, we reached the territory of Fezzan. Good bye, Touaricks! farewell to the land of the brave and the free! Farewell, ye Barbarians! where prisons, gibbets, murders, and assassinations are unheard of. We now tread the soil of despotism, decapitations, slavery and civilization, under the benign Ottoman rule, in conjunction with the Christianized Powers of Europe! The boundaries of Ghat and Fezzan are determined by two conspicuous objects, first, by a chain of mountains running north-east and south-west, joining the oases of Fezzan on the north, and extending to the Tibboo towns on the south, the eastern side of all which chain is claimed by the masters of Fezzan, the western by the Touaricks of Ghat; and secondly the forests of tholh trees, which are now appearing in our north, affording abundant wood to the people of the caravan, and browsing for the camels. I am now, then, once more under the power of the Porte, and within the region of Turkish civilization. Passed other desert mosques, with some Arabic characters written in the sand, near the Keblah.

To-night the moon shone with a sun's splendour; all our people seemed startled at this prodigious effulgence of light. Several of the slaves ran out amongst the tholh trees, and began to dance and kick up their heels as if possessed. It might remind them of the clear moonlit banks and woods of Niger. Haj Ibrahim at last got out his umbrella and put it up, "What's that for?" I asked. "The moon is corrupt (fesed), its light will give me fever. You must put up your broken umbrella." So said all our people, and related many stories of persons struck by the moon and dying instantaneously[103]. This is another illustration of the passage, "The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night." (Ps. cxxi. 6.) In the Scriptures are several allusions to a stroke of the sun, (see Is. xLix. 10, Rev. vii. 16,) but few to the moon-stroke. Saharan opinion is that the moon-stroke is fatal. I am not aware that the moon-stroke is well authenticated by our eminent physicians. The writer of the psalm spoke the current language of his epoch of science. It is probable that "moon-struck madness," and strokes of the moon, are the effects of noisome or infectious vapours which crowd about the night, and obscure with a still paler light that pale luminary. The sun-stroke seems to be well-authenticated; many cases of Europeans going hunting and sporting in the open country of Barbary, then and there receiving a stroke of the sun, and dying with fever, are on record.

14th.—Course as usual, north-east. Cold to-day. Skirt the mountain-chain on our right, and traverse a vast plain, scattered with pebbles and other small stones. As yet, we have not passed over sands or through any sandy region, although sand-ranges bounded the west in the early part of the route; here and there a little sand, loose and flying about. Our road is a splendid carriage-road. Oh, were there but water! But water is the all and everything in The Desert. Encamped on the limitless plain. How variable is Saharan weather: now, at sunset, a tempest rises, and sweeps the bosom of The Desert with "the besom of destruction!" A high wind continued all night. I fancied myself at sea, but preferred the Ocean Desert, its groaning hurricane, its hideous barrenness, to the heaving and roaring of the Ocean of Waters. We passed another desert mosque; it was only a simple line, slightly curved for the Keblah. There were also some letters written on the earth, in Arabic, passages from the Koran. Other writing on the ground is always smoothed over, and not allowed to remain. Part of the road was covered with heaps of stone, as if done to clear it, as well as to direct travellers en route.

The Shereef introduced the subject of religion to-night in conversation. He observed:—

"The torments of the damned are like all the fires in the world put together."

I.—"Are these torments eternal?"

The Shereef.—"Yes, as everlasting as Paradise."

I.—"But do you not continually say, 'God is The Most Merciful.' How can this be?"

The Shereef.—"I don't know, so it is decreed." The Shereef boldly continued, "In this world[104] God has given all the infidels plenty of good things, (this being a sly allusion to the Christians and their possession of great wealth); but, in the next world, the believers only will enjoy good, and the kafer will be miserable." "You, Yâkob," he proceeded, "are near the truth, very near, and near Paradise, because you can read and write Arabic, and understand our holy books."

And so he went on preaching me a very orthodox sermon. I asked him how God would dispose of those who never read or heard of Mahomet or the Koran. He couldn't tell. The same queries and objections are, nevertheless, applicable to our own and to nearly all religions, which make the condition of believing one thing, and one class of doctrines, absolute for salvation. The Touatee gold-merchant, who was close by at the time, interposed, "You are near jinnah (Paradise), Yâkob, one word only, 'There is no God but God, and Mahomet is the prophet of God.'" I returned, "If this be not uttered from the heart it is useless and mockery." "By G—d! you are right, Yâkob," exclaimed the Shereef. Like most Mahometans, the Shereef says, "The coming of Jesus is near, when he will destroy all the enemies of God, Jews and Christians, and give the world and its treasures into the hands of the Moslemites." I asked him why he represented all mankind but the Moslemites to be the enemies of God? My mind always recoils from the thought of arranging mankind, and marshalling them forward, so many enemies of God, as if the Eternal and Almighty Being who planned, formed, and sustains the universal frame of nature, could have enemies! Man may be the enemy of his fellow man, but cannot be the enemy of God. The Shereef here did not know what to say, and I think replied very properly, Allah Errahman Errahem, "God is most merciful!" a sentiment which all of us admit in spite of our peculiar dogmas of theology. But this conversation offers nothing new or different from those which I had with my taleb Ben Mousa, at Ghadames.

The Shereef then spoke about slavery, and asked me, why the English forced the Bey of Tunis to abolish the traffic in slaves. I explained the circumstances, adding, the Bey was not forced, but only recommended, by the English Government to abolish the slave traffic. He then began a long story in palliation of the traffic, stating that the slaves knew not God, and that in being enslaved by the Mohammedans they were taught to know God. I soon stopped his mouth, first, by telling him, the Turks not long ago had enslaved the Arabs and sold them for slaves at Constantinople, and then, adding, "Nearly all the princes, whence the Soudanese and Bornouese slaves were brought, are professedly Mahometans, as well as their people." He acknowledged, however, slaves were mostly procured by banditti hunting them, not captured in war. He finished, "The Touaricks of Ghat formerly hunted for slaves in the Tibboo country, twice or thrice in the year, and in these razzia expeditions some would get a booty of three, or five, six, ten, and twenty, according as they were fortunate. Now they have other business on hand, the war with the Shânbah. The Touaricks of Aheer, those who bring the senna, are now the great slave-hunters." The Shereef showed me a Tibboo youth seized by the Aheer people. The Shereef's account of the Touarghee razzias in the Tibboo country is confirmed by the reports of our Bornou expedition, or rather the Shereef confirms the reports of our countrymen. Dr. Oudney says, "It is along these hills (the ranges which go as far as the Tibboo country) the Touaricks make their grassies (razzias) into the Tibboo country. These two nations are almost always at war, and reciprocally annoy each other by predatory warfare, stealing camels, slaves, &c., killing only when resistance is made, and never making prisoners." But, it must be observed, Touaricks are never made slaves; they may be murdered by the Tibboos. Not six months ago the Aheer Touaricks captured a Tibboo village. The few who escaped fled to the Arabs, under the son of Abd-el-Geleel, imploring aid for the restoration of their countrymen and property. These Arabs, who themselves mostly live on freebooting, were glad of the opportunity for a razzia. They recaptured everything, and restored the poor Tibboos to their village, making also a capture of a thousand camels from these Kylouy Touaricks.

Enjoy better health in this journey, than on that from Ghadames to Ghat. Felt myself stronger, and hope yet to undertake the journey to Bornou before the summer heats.

15th.—Course to-day nearly east. Encamped just as the sun dipped down in the ruddy flame of the west. Strong wind, blanching the sooty cheeks of the poor slaves, who were borne down with exhaustion. They were literally whipped along. And the little fellow who refused a ride from me, got a whipping for sitting on the sand to rest himself. I now made him mount my camel, which his master, not a bad-natured man, thanked me for. All day we continued to traverse the vast plain, having on our right the same chain of hills, and, on the left, the sand groups, as far as the eye could see. These broad, now boundless plains, or valleys, are unquestionably the dry beds of former currents. Even now our people called them wadys or rivers. The chain of mountains and the chain of sand-hills are their natural banks. The tholh-tree was most abundant to-day. I never saw it so thickly scattered before. It was spread over all the plain, now in single trees, and now in forest groups, which were also magnified in the distance, and had a grateful and refreshing effect upon the vision, wearied with looking on stones or gravel, or bare desert, or black rocks and glaring sand-hills. Unquestionably these trees of the African are as old as those of the American wilderness. The tholh-trees of the dry thirsty African plain are however but dwarfs compared with the giant trees of the American forest, watered by ocean rivers. The tholh would seem to live without moisture: it is fed by no annual or periodic rain, no springs. And yet it buds, opens its pretty yellow flowers, sheds its fine large drops of translucent gum, flourishes all the year round, and tempts with its prickly leaves as with richest herbage, the hungry camel. Indeed, about this part of the route the camels get nothing else to feed on. We have seen no living creatures these last five days. On one part of our route our people pretended to trace the sand-prints of the wadan, and others affirmed them to be the foot-marks of the wild-ox. I must except the sight of a few small birds, black all over but the tails. Some one or two had white heads, as well as white tails. People say these birds drink no water, as they say many animals of The Sahara drink no water. The little creatures certainly do not drink much water. Two or three dead camels thrown across the route of this day's march. The live camels usually turn off the way from them. Several Saharan mosques, the form of a cross being made in the Keblah on one of them, as seen in the diagrams.

The Shereef's ideas of the Touaricks are not so favourable as those of his uncle, the Governor of Ghat, and in some respects they are more correct. The Shereef says:—"The Touaricks are not of the Arabian race. They are the original inhabitants of Africa (Numidians). Their language is a Berber dialect. They are a race generally of bandits, and, when their food fails them, like famished wolves, they make irruptions into their neighbour's territory, and plunder what is before them. This they do in small bodies, when camel's milk fails them at home. The Aheer Touaricks are of the same race as those of Ghat. Many of those of Aheer have no fear of God, and never pray like the rest of professed Mohammedans. Those of Ghat are perhaps the best of the Touaricks, and the most religious. The Touaricks of Touat encircle those of Ghat, lying across the route of Timbuctoo. Their Sultan's name is Bassa, a giant of The Desert. He eats as much as ten men. He is the terror of all. But Jabour knows him, and enjoys his friendship and confidence. The road from Ghat to Timbuctoo, through Bassa's territory, is extremely short. It is stony, through high mountains, and intensely cold. Springs of water abound there." Such are the ideas and opinions of the Shereef on the Touaricks. The mountains of the route alluded to, are the grand nucleus of the Hagar, which intersect and ramify through all Central Sahara. The Shereef, and some others travelling with us, delight in paradoxes, and maintain, in spite of Haj Ibrahim, who has been to Constantinople and seen the Sultan of the Turks, that there is no Sultan now, the administration at the Turkish capital being in the hands of Christians.

The Shereef now invited me to dine with him from bazeen, and when I sat down, kept addressing me:—"Eat plenty!" But only think of three grown men sitting down to a small paste dumpling, with a little melted butter poured over it, and the host crying out lustily to me:—"Eat plenty!" Such, indeed, was our repast! Of course, returning to my encampment, I ate my supper as if nothing had happened to me. And this little dumpling supper is the only meal in the day which our people eat. Well may they cry out about the cold, and pray for the heat. In a hot day a man is supposed to eat half the quantity which he does in a cold day. I am, therefore, still of the same opinion as before expressed, that the sufferings of these people, who travel in Sahara, are enormously increased from their want of sufficient food and clothing. As to clothing, many of them, in this trying season, go half-naked.

Some of our Arabs, who make bazeen for a large party, have a scientific way for its cooking and preparation. On the Ghat route a young Arab was accustomed to fill up three parts of a large iron pot with water. This water he would boil, throwing into it the meanwhile peppers, sliced onions, and occasionally, as a luxury, very small pieces of dried meat, or scraps from which fat had been strained. The pot having boiled until the onions and peppers were soft, he now brings the meal, mostly barley-meal, but sometimes coarse wheaten flour. This he pours into the pot, forming a sort of pyramid in the boiling water. He then gets a stick, mostly a walking-stick, pretending first to scrape off the dirt, or rubbing it in the sand; with the stick so polished, he makes a hole in the centre of the pyramid of meal, through which the water bubbles up and circulates through the mealy mass, now fast cooking. He now gets two small pieces of stick, and puts them into the ears of the iron pot, which generally are burning hot. He removes with the pieces of stick the pot from off the fire, and places it on the sand. He now squats down over it, putting his two feet, or rather the great toes of the feet, one on each ear of the pot, which gives him a poise, or sort of fulcrum. And then, again, taking the long stick, he stirs it up with all his might, round and round and round again, until all the water is absorbed in the pudding-like meal, and the meal is thus well mixed into a sort of dough. However this dough is not unbaked paste, but a bonâ-fide dumpling, cooked and ready for the sauce. Now comes the wash wherewith to wash it down. My young Arab friend takes the dumpling, or pudding, in a great round mass, and places it within a huge wooden bowl. He then goes off for the oil, or liquid butter, which is usually kept in a large leather bottle, or goat's-skin, with a long neck. He does not pour the oil out, but thrusts one of his hands into the oil, and, taking it out, with his other hand rubs or squeezes off the oil over the mass of dumpling. When he has got enough, he sets to and sucks his fingers, as the great reward of all his labour in preparing the supper of bazeen for his companions. Once he did not sufficiently squeeze off the oil from his hands, and his uncle scolded him for leaving so much on to suck. He protested to his uncle that the bazeen had taken him an unusually long time to prepare[105]. The supper is now ready. The party squat round it on their hams. They dig into the mass with their fingers, after saying aloud, as grace, Bismillah, "In the name of God," before they begin supper. Digging thus into it, they make small or large balls, according to the measure of their jaws, which are generally sufficiently wide, or according to the sharpness or dulness of their appetite. These balls they roll and roll over in the oil or sauce that is often made of a herb called hada, or âseedah, a pleasant bitter, and producing a yellow decoction, (whence the bazeen is sometimes called,) which enables the large boluses to slip quietly and gratefully down the throat. Meanwhile a jug of water is handed round, provided always there is any difficulty in getting down the balls; but mostly the water is handed round after the eating. It is drunk with a bismallah, and then a hamdullah, or "praise to God," the grace after meat, winds up and finishes the repast.

The business of the caravan and its affairs of encampment are always terminated before supper. So the dumpling or pudding-fed travellers now roll themselves up in their barracans, covering their faces entirely, and stretch themselves down on the ground to sleep, frequently not moving from the place where they ate their supper. There is generally a mat or skin under them, and they lie down under the shade of the bales of goods which their camels carry. The first thing on encamping is to look for the direction of the wind, and so to arrange bales of goods, panniers, and camel gear, as to protect the head from the wind. In this way one often lies very snug whilst the tempest howls through The Desert. People like to retain the taste of the pudding in their mouths, particularly if a little fat or oil be poured over it. I once gave an Arab some coffee after his pudding-supper, which he drank with avidity, but afterwards began to abuse me. "Yâkob, what is your coffee? I'm hungry, I'm ravenous. Why, before I drank your coffee, my supper was up to the top of my throat, but now I want to begin my supper again. I'll never drink any more of your coffee, so don't bring it here." A little more cuscasou is eaten on this route than on that of Ghat from Ghadames, the Fezzaneers and Tripolines preferring coarse cuscasou to bazeen if they can get it. The poor Arabs are often obliged to put up with zumeetah, which they eat cold. Haj Ibrahim eats his fine cuscasou, which he brought from Tripoli, but I do not consider him a bonâ-fide Saharan merchant. This is his first trip in The Desert.

6th.—Rose as the day broke, with a hazy yellow tint over half the heavens, and started early in order to reach the well before night. Very cold, and continued so all day long. Felt my nerves braced, and liked cold better than heat. In proportion as I liked the cold, all my travelling companions disliked this weather; all were shivering and crumpled up creatures. The slaves suffered dreadfully, having shivering-fits and their eyes streaming with water. However, I could not help laughing at the Shereef and the Touatee, who kept crying out, as if in pain, "Mou zain el-berd (Not good is the cold!)" And, to make it worse, they both rode all day, by which they felt the cold more. On the contrary, I walked full three hours, and scarcely felt myself fatigued. Indeed, to-day, I was decidedly the best man of the caravan, and suffered less than any. I always walk an hour and a half every morning. But my Ghadames shoes, that I'm anxious to preserve, are fast wearing out, which spoils some of the pleasure. The small stones of Desert soon cut and wear out a pair of soles, which are made of untanned camel's skin. Observed to the Shereef, to tease him, "Why, you Mussulmans don't know what is good. Your legs and feet are bare. You have nothing wrapt tight round your chest. Your woollens are pervious to the cold air. You're half naked; but for myself, I'm clothed from head to foot, only a small portion of my face is exposed. You must go to the Christians to learn how to travel The Desert." "The Christians are devils," he returned, "and can bear cold and heat like the Father of the imps in his house (perdition)." "Mou zain, el-berd," cried the Touatee. Yesterday and this morning the slaves were oiled all over with olive-oil, to prevent their skin and flesh from cracking with the cold. This is a frequent practice, and reckoned a sovereign remedy. Hot oil is also often swallowed. Boiling oil is a favourite remedy in North Africa for many diseases. The poor slaves were again driven on by the whip. We reached the well just after sunset. Haj Ibrahim rode far in advance on his maharee to see that the well was all right, our water being exhausted. Happily the weather prevented any great absorption of its water. When the slaves got up, having suffered much to-day from thirst, although so cold, they rushed upon the water to drink, kneeling on the sands, and five or six putting their heads in a bowl of water together. I myself had only drunk two cups of tea this morning, Said having given the slaves all the water we had left. To-day's march convinced me that thirst may be felt as painfully on a cold day as on a hot day.

Course, north-east, inclining to east. Met with some Fezzanee Touaricks, who were a very different class of people from those of Ghat and Aheer. They are simple shepherds, tending their flocks, mostly goats, in open Desert, which browse the scanty herbage of the plain. The mountain chain on our right continues north with us. We found in our route the blood and filth of a camel just killed. Dead or killed camels, are generally found near the wells on the last day's journey, after having made five or six days' forced marches to reach them. It is here they're knocked up, going continually and most patiently to the last moment of their strength, when they expire at once.

Teenabunda or "Well of Bunda," is a well of sweet delicious water. It is some thirty or forty feet deep. There is nothing to mark the site of the well from the surrounding plain, nor palm tree, nor shrub, nor herbage of any kind. An accident alone could have discovered this well. Some stones are placed about in the form of seats, and one can easily see where there has once been a fire from the sign or circumstance of three stones being placed triangularly, leaving a small space between them for the fire. These three stones also support the pot for cooking, as well as inclose the fire. This evening took some bazeen with the Ghadamsee merchants. They are fond of showing me this little mark of hospitality. However the same thing was enacted as at the Shereef's supper. Three grown-up persons sat down to the one day's meal, a smallish dumpling, seasoned with highly peppered sauce of hada, and a little fat. It is quite absurd to call this a supper for three persons; it is mocking European appetite. How they live in this way I cannot comprehend.

17th.—Rose early, but did not start until the sun had two hours mounted the horizon. We usually start half an hour after sunrise. Weather fair and fine, a cool breeze and hot sun, which is suitable for the middle of the day. I do not feel it at all oppressive. Continued north-east. We now caught a glimpse of the palms of The Wady. But here we overtook our Tripoline friends, who had left Ghat ten days before us and were waiting for our arrival. They conducted us to their encampment. The party consisted of Mustapha, an Alexandrian merchant of Tripoli, and another merchant, having with them some sixty slaves. When our slaves arrived these ran out to meet them, welcoming them in a most affectionate manner as old friends. In fact, most of them had been companions in the route from Aheer to Ghat, sharing one another's burthens and sufferings, helping to alleviate their mutual pains. After being separated and sold to different masters, never expecting to see one another again, it is not surprising there should have been such a tender and affectionate meeting of the poor things. I shall not soon forget the sight of two little girls who unexpectedly met after being sold to different masters and separated some weeks. The little creatures seized hold of one another's hands, then each took the the head of each other with the palms of the hand, pressing its side, in the meanwhile kissing one another passionately and sobbing aloud. And yet those brutal republicans of America,

"Whose fustian flag of freedom, waves In mockery o'er a land of slaves—"

have the devilish cruelty to continue to stigmatize, by their laws of equality and liberty, the Africans as goods and chattels, depriving them of their divine right of sentient and intellectual beings, having all the tenderest and holiest affections of humanity. These poor little girls were quite unobserved by their masters or drivers, who were now occupied with the rakas or courier, who had brought letters from Tripoli in answer to ours sent some time ago. The news is good for the merchants; the Pasha will not exact the customs-dues of Fezzan on those who return this route, on account of the war between the Shânbah and Touaricks.

Near the well Haj Omer beckoned me to show me what he called, "water-courses of Christians," ancient irrigating ducts of the people of former times. These consisted of raised banks of earth, stretching across the road to the mountains on the right. Along these lines of embankment were large fields of cultivation, showing the country had declined in its agricultural industry, which, indeed, is manifest from every oasis I have yet seen in The Sahara. It is probable these earlier or ancient cultivators of the soil were colonies from the coast. Omer also pointed out at a distance, what he styled "The tombs of Christians," on the sides of the mountains, scattered miles along, showing The Desert to have been cultivated to a far greater extent in past times.

Our route from Ghat to Fezzan is good enough perhaps for man, being simple and plain, easily traversed, generally on level surfaces, but it is very bad for animals, there being scarcely any herbage, except at Serdalas, and the Ghat Wadys. Our camels had little herbage for seven days, which greatly tried their strength and endurance. The caravan we now joined had lost two camels, and I was afraid for my nagah. Water they had none for six days. The Soudan sheep also went without water those six long days. Our route is thus mentioned by Dr. Oudney: "There are several routes to Ghat (from Mourzuk); and the upper one, where we had to enter the hills, was last night fixed for us. There is plenty of water, but more rough than the lower, which is said to be a sandy plain, as level as the hand, but no water for five days." Travelling with slaves, a route is always extended one-fifth, at the very least: such was our case.

Afternoon, we encamped at the mouth of the wady, weary, thirsty, and exhausted, which forcibly brought to my mind that oasis of rest, (wearied and disgusted, as I felt with Saharan travel,) so divinely described in Desert pastoral style: ' , . . . . . (Rev vii. 16, 17.) We have in these divine words the smiting and parching of Saharan sun and heat, and the Lamb-Shepherd leading the drooping flocks to the living life-giving springs of the oases of Desert.

Our people called the series of little oases, which we now entered, El-Wady. But this term is hardly sufficiently distinctive, and, I think in the general division of Fezzan, it is called El-Wady Ghurby— —or "The Western Valley," in contra-distinction from El-Wady Esh-Sherky, "The Eastern Valley."

18th.—Entered fully into The Wady this morning. After so much Desert, was delighted to ecstasy with the refreshing sight of the distant forests of palms, crowd upon crowd in deepening foliage, their graceful heads covering the face of the pale red horizon, as with hanging raven locks of some beautiful woman. Saw a few huts of date branches, some wells, and here and there a villager. The huts were so blended with the date-palms, in colour and make, that it was with difficulty our eye could catch sight of them. I am often astonished how these slight, feeble tenements can protect the people from the sun and cold and wind. It is like living in open Desert. When we had continued our course some two hours, the Sheikh of the district came running out after us, demanding the customs-dues, and attempting to stop the slaves for payment. "What does this fellow want?" I said to our people, feeling myself now under the protection of the Tripoline government, and knowing the Sheikh to be subjected to the Bey of Mourzuk. They replied, "Oh, he wants some slaves to work at the water (by irrigation)." The Sheikh would not be said "nay." He demanded to see the teskera of the Pasha exempting us from the duties, which he could not, as Haj Ibrahim was gone to purchase dates. He then commenced seizing slaves, but our Arabs now attacked him, pushing and dragging him away. These people are mighty fond of a little scuffling. We encamped for the night in The Wady. More "Tombs of Christians" were pointed out to me. Many dwarf palms were scattered about, wild and producing no fruit. Water may be under the surface. Our people say these palms would all bear fruit if cultivated and watered. Undoubtedly many more could be cultivated. There are innumerable palms in this wild dwarf state. My nagah growled and grumbled on seeing the palms, rightly concluding that we were arrived in an inhabited country. These melancholy-looking creatures are extremely wise. The other evening we had great trouble to get the nagah to eat herbage when she was brought to the encampment. She had for her supper every evening a few dates and barley for several successive days. Now we left off giving her them on arriving at The Wady, where there was abundant herbage. This she resented, and grumbled nearly all night, keeping us from sleeping, and would not eat the herbage. On encamping, the camels are allowed to stray and graze an hour or two, and are then brought up to the encampment for the night, the drivers cutting a little herbage for them to eat during the night, or in the morning before starting. Like us, more intelligent brutes, the camels don't like starting on a journey with an empty stomach.

Haj Ibrahim expressed surprise that I had with me religious books. He thought the English had "no books," (that is, religious books.) Some Christians in Tripoli (Roman Catholics) had told him the English people had no books. He then observed to me, that it was wrong to worship Mary, who was not God, or the mother of God, for God had no mother or father. And although the French and Maltese, in Tripoli, had told him the English had a bad religion, it could not, he observed, be a worse religion than this, that of worshiping a woman instead of God. Of Mary, he continued, "She was a good woman, and conceived without a husband. Mary merely wished to bear a child, and as it was a pious wish, God granted her request, and by a simple word she conceived and bore Jesus." Of slaves, the merchant, says:—"They are brought from all countries of Soudan, nearly a thousand countries. Only a few slaves captured or brought to the Souk are Mussulmans, they're nearly all Pagans. Mussulmans make war against infidels to get prisoners, as we and you did formerly; the Maltese[106] and English made us slaves, and we made you slaves. Some of the slaves are Christians, (i. e. Pagans,) and some are Jews." I was much interested, and questioned the merchant about this latter remark, when a Negro slave, who had been lately to Soudan with his master, observed, "The black Jews keep the Sabbath, and get drunk on that day. They drink bouza (or grain liquor). They also circumcise as we Mohammedans." It is probable these Negro Jews are the corrupt descendants of the converts of Abyssinian Jews, who ages ago penetrated Central Africa viâ the provinces of Darfour and Kordofan, and the countries lying on the two great branches of the sources of the Nile. In the beginning of our era, we hear of the Eunuch of the "Queen of the South[107]," or of Abyssinia, who was a Jew, and converted by Philip to Christianity. There is therefore no manner of difficulty in accounting for the presence of these corrupt degenerate black Jews, amongst the tribes of Central Africa.

Two little girl-slaves were barbarously whipped this evening for eating hasheesh (herbage), which they picked up on the roadside. This was done to prevent them having diarrha, and eating poisonous herbs. It was nevertheless what they had been taught to do on the Aheer route, and there could not be very much harm in picking up a little fresh juicy herbage, to appease their thirst during the heat of the day's march. The slaves en route are only permitted to drink twice in the day, once at noon, and once in the evening. When our supply of water is scanty, only once a day.

19th.—This morning made but three hours' journey through The Wady Oases. We had not proceeded an hour en route, when the same farce was attempted to be played upon us as yesterday; three or four people coming galloping up to us to stop us, in order to collect the customs-dues. This they did a second time, after letting us go on once. I was determined now to show I was not a slave-dealer, and would not be stopped to suit their caprice, for we told them we had a teskera from the Pasha, exempting us from the gomerick. Proceeding forwards with Said, one of the party, a fellow on horse-back, stopped my nagah, seized her, and commenced beating Said. I instantly jumped off, exclaiming, "I'm an Englishman—a Christian, and not a slave-dealer; I have nothing on which to pay duties, and will not be stopped." Our people bawled out likewise, "The Christian has nothing for the gomerick, he has no slaves." The fellow gave Said another rap with his sword on his attempting to rescue our camel. Hereupon, losing all patience, I took the spear, and with the flat part of its head gave the fellow a tolerable blow on the shoulders. Now followed a desperate scuffle, the first I had had in The Desert. The fellow screaming out, suddenly maddened to fury, drew his sword, and made a thrust at me, but the blow was turned by the shaft of my lance. Our people now seized hold of him and me. A little more scuffling went on, and getting clear of the grasp of our people, I made off in advance, with Said, alone. After continuing half an hour through the palm-woods, we turned and saw the whole caravan coming up quickly after us. The party who stopped us had consented to let the caravan follow me. Haj Ibrahim, who had the Pasha's teskera, was again absent, having gone to purchase more dates. If the fellow had not been very impudent and violent, inflicting blows on Said, I should not have committed this folly of forcing my way, for, after all, it was great imprudence on my part, and might have been attended with very serious consequences.

When the caravan came up, I said, in hearing of our people, to the fellow who was still following them, "If you had struck my servant in Tripoli, the Pasha would have put you in prison. This is not Touarghee country, but a country where there is a government. This country belongs to Tripoli and the Sultan. Your violence was equally improper and unnecessary." All applauded this, and our champion of the sword said nothing in reply. After arriving at the small district of Blad Marabouteen, or "a country of Marabouts," we encamped for the day. The fellow, who turned out to be an Egyptian, a petty officer of the Porte, and Kaed of the district through which we passed, now came to me, sat down by my side, and made it up. I then observed to him, "It's all nonsense." The Egyptian laughed and I laughed. He kept seizing me by the hand, and exclaiming with vehemence, "Gagliuffi! Gagliuffi! ah! that's a fine fellow! Gagliuffi at Mourzuk." Again the Egyptian laughed, and screamed with frantic gesticulations, and our people coming up were also merry with him. "Ah!" he continued, "Gagliuffi, a real cock of the dunghill, a noble fellow, Gagliuffi! Do you know Gagliuffi?" I said I did not. This he couldn't understand, and said, "Ah, Gagliuffi has got plenty of money, he's the Bashaw of Mourzuk. Every time you go to see him he gives you coffee." Another Fezzaneer, standing by, swore to this: "Gagliuffi is the Bey! Gagliuffi has got plenty of money." Afterwards I reported this affair to Mr. Gagliuffi, our Vice-Consul at Mourzuk. He was greatly amused and flattered at the report of his wealth and consequence. He observed, "Although I'm poor enough, God knows, it's better that these people should think me rich." The Egyptian was commanding a small force of Arabs in The Wady. I learnt from him, the Vice-Consul had been sick lately, but was now better. In The Wady there is fever during summer, but not much now. The Kaed, I saw in conversing with him, had been drinking leghma, and was "elevated," which sufficiently accounted for his interrupting our march, and the violence of his conduct. Our people say, he wished us to encamp in his district, to amuse himself with us. They continued all the evening to praise my spirit for resisting the fellow's impertinence in his stopping us. "To-day you were a man, Yâkob," they kept repeating. I explained, "Fear, where fear is necessary, as in the Touarghee districts. There we must bow the head, for resistance would be dangerous. But here, in the country of the Sultan, why should we fear?" This speech greatly pleased our people, who themselves had not been detained by the Kaed, on account of my forcing the way. Upon the whole, this ludicrous affray raised my reputation for (physical) courage amongst the people. For moral courage I always take credit to myself. It is nevertheless, a very delicate thing in Saharan travel to know when and where resistance is to be offered against imposition: and perhaps, it is better to give way always than to resist, leaving the matters of dispute (of this sort especially) to be settled by the caravan with which you travel.

The united caravans will remain here some eight or ten days, to give rest to the slaves, as well as to obtain fresh provisions. To-morrow morning I go early to Mourzuk, which is two days from The Wady. Tripoli is distant from The Wady, fifteen, seventeen, or twenty days, according to the progress of the caravan. The route lies direct viâ Shaty, four days' distant from this, and Mizdah, in the mountains (Gharian), ten or twelve days, and thence three days more to Tripoli. The route from El-Wady to Shaty consists of groups of sand-hills, of painful traverse. Shaty itself is a series of oases. Between El-Hasee and El-Ghareeah, which now follow, there is an immeasurable expanse of Desert plain. The Atlas Mountains then succeed with their bubbling fountains and green valleys, and olive-clad peaks. Mizdah in The Mountains consists of two large villages.

Saw several of the inhabitants of The Wady, and made acquaintance with the Fezzaneers, as they have been called. Some of them are as black as negroes, others as white as the Moors of the coast, others olive, yellow, brown, &c., and their features are various as the colour of their complexions. The Fezzaneers must be considered Moors and townspeople, rather than Arabs or nomades. Houses in The Wady are of palm-branches, and some of sun-dried mud-bricks, but mostly miserable hovels, the very picture of wretchedness. We passed a village entirely abandoned, (Kelah, as the people said,) apparently from the failure of water. Palms in The Wady are not very fine. There are many patches of cultivation of grain and vegetables. Water is found near the surface, and the wells are numerous.

20th.—I left our caravan early this morning for Mourzuk. On taking leave of my companions of travel they begged me to come back, and continue the route with them to Tripoli. Could only promise in the style of En-Shallah, "If God wills," for I had long made up my time not to return. Should the Bornou route be favourable, I might go up before the hot weather came on; if not, I intend returning viâ Sockna to Tripoli, "the royal road," wishing to see as much as possible of the inhabitants of the oases of The Sahara, on which route were many centres of population. My companions, from whom I had received nothing but kindness, continued to call after me, "Come back, Yâkob," until our little company was out of sight. I thought this extremely friendly, and another instance of the unadulterated kindness of heart found in Saharan traders. Our course now lay somewhat back again, we proceeding south-east. We had to cut through the mountains which had been so long on our right. The range still continued north up The Wady, but how far I cannot tell. I believe no European whatever has travelled the route viâ Shaty and Mizdah, to Tripoli. As we ascended through the gorge or break in the chain, "the tombs of the Christians" were again pointed out to me, or rather the burying-places of the earlier inhabitants of these regions. All the early inhabitants, or those before the Mohammedan conquest of Africa, are vulgarly called Ensara by Moors. These tombs consist simply of circular heaps of stones, picked up from the rocks around. Some are large, perhaps a dozen yards in circumference. Mounting one, I found it hollow at the top; the stones had been merely heaped up in a circular ring. Within was a little sand settled, collected from the wind when it scatters the sand about. There was no appearance of bones, or any inscriptions. The whole mountain range of The Wady, I am told, has heaps of stones piled up in this way. There is no doubt but what they are the graves of former inhabitants.

The question to be solved is, why are these graves of this circular form? why heaps or rings of stones thus heaped up, so different from the long square graves now met with in all North Africa and The Desert? The form of these tumuli evidently denote another people, or at least a people of another religion. Where there are tombs there are legends of the dead. My travelling companions now related to me, that there appears not unfrequently, and mostly at midnight, when the moon has but a narrow dim circlet, a solitary Christian, who flits mournfully through these solitudes, now and then sitting on the circular tombs, now peeping from within the rings of stones, his chin resting on the edge. His aspect is hideous, and he has one big burning eye-ball in the middle of his forehead. His skin (for he is naked) is covered with long hair, like a shaggy goat (a species of satyr), and two tusks come out of his mouth, like those of a wild boar. A holy Marabout once met him, and interrogated him courageously about his doleful doings amongst these graves. The spectre deigned this answer, "I mourn the fall of my fellow-Christians and the triumph of the Faithful over the Infidels. The Devil makes me come here. I shall wander until the appearance of Gog and Magog upon the earth, and then shall be yoked to their chariot, and go out and conquer the world, and kill the Faithful. But I shall be tormented afterwards. Such is my doom: I can't help it." It is said the Marabout pitied him, and prayed to God for him, but it was revealed to the holy man in a dream, not to pray for lost spirits, whom Heaven's decrees had irrevocably doomed to perdition.

There was also another legend related to me by the Fezzan Targhee, who was now my guide through this dreary gorge, full of the tombs of the dead. It is too long to repeat. Suffice it to say that, whilst his great-grandfather and other shepherds were tending their flocks on the subjected plains below, a troop of these Christians broke loose from the dark caverns in the mountains, where they are chained, and began to abuse and banter the shepherds, because they did not say, "There are three Gods." The shepherds withstood the temptation and the terror of their countenances, although they, the shepherds, exceedingly quaked. The Christians, in their rage against the shepherds professing so constantly the Unity of God, dispersed their flocks, drove them into the caverns, and disappeared together with the flocks. But the angel Gabriel descended from heaven, and blessed the faithful shepherds, led them on many miles to a desert place, where there were three tholh-trees which had been planted by these reprobate Spirits in adoration to The Three Gods. Now the number of shepherds also happened to be three. The good Gabriel told them to cut down the trees, and burn them separately. The shepherds did so, and for their obedience, from beneath the ashes a great cake of molten gold came pouring out. "These cakes are the Gods of the Christians; there are three of these cakes," said Gabriel. "Take each one, and go, and trade to Soudan," added the angelical messenger; and then in a bright cloud ascended over the top of the mountains. It so happened that his great-grandfather thought three was a lucky number, and wished to become a Christian, whereupon God caused a troop of banditti to fall upon his caravan, who plundered him of everything, and reduced him again to beggary. Such are the tales of Marabouts of The Sahara, quite a match for the legends of our Monks of the good and happy olden times.

As these legends finished, we got up to the top of the range, when a cold bleak wind cut our faces, coming north-east over the plateau, which to my surprise now appeared. I expected to find a descent, or another rounded side of the chain. But all east was a bare, bleak, black plateau, as hideous as desolation could render it, according well with the scenery of the desolate grave-stones we had just seen, and the woeful tales about them we had heard. It was the veritable beach of the river Styx. I turned with a chill of horror from the waste back again upon the valley which we had left. How different the view! Here we beheld the ten thousand fair waving palms, which cover the green bosom of The Wady,—a paradise encircled with ridges and outlines of the most frightful sterility. We now mounted our camels, for it was necessary to face also this new desert. I greatly perspired with the labour of the ascent, and now caught a cold, and had a bilious attack, the only time I was seriously unwell during my nine months in The Desert, and strange enough that it should be occasioned by cold. Our party consisted of myself and Said, the Targhee guide, and Mustapha, the Tripoline Moor, who was going to purchase provisions, and borrow money at Mourzuk. These merchants so ill manage their affairs, that they were nearly out of provisions for their some hundred and odd slaves, themselves and servants, and besides had no money to replenish their stock. Our course was now east verging to the south. On the plain I saw the last of the Touaricks, and it was a noble sight. This was a Targhee Scout, scouring The Desert in search of the Shânbah, well-equipped and mounted on his maharee. He was returning south-west to Ghat, taking the route over the mountains which we had just ascended.



After a few hours we again descended into a small shallow wady, where was a little herbage. We continued all day, and endeavoured to reach a part of the plateau, where were some Fezzan Touaricks tending their flocks, and where it was said we should get milk and a kid of the goat to kill and eat. The whole of the day it was cold, and the wind piercing, which I attributed to the elevated region we traversed. On arriving at a thin scattered forest of tholh-trees we stopped, but being most unusually exhausted by the fatigue of the ride, and the attack of the bile, I could not dismount from my camel, and was lifted off. We searched a long time for the shepherds, and at length their flocks were discovered. I took a little tea, and surrendered myself to rest and to sleep, not being able to eat anything. My companions pretended to seek out and purchase a kid, but unless you furnish the money, nothing of this luxurious sort is ever obtained in The Desert. I had no money, and we had no kid. Meanwhile our people, who had only brought with them dates, ate up my little stock of cuscasou. I had only laid in a sufficient quantity for some fifteen days, from Ghat to Mourzuk. Passed a bad night, and greatly relaxed.

21st.—Up to this time I had always travelled through The Desert with a large number of persons. Our party was now only four. And yet I felt no fear, and went to bed last night in open desert with as much indifference as if I had been in a hotel in Europe. Such is the force of habit. The Desert itself now even begins to wear a homely face to me, and, indeed, for the present, I am obliged to make it my home. We rose early, and I found myself a little better. At the time I attributed my illness to the water of The Wady, but which was incorrect. Before starting, I obtained a bowl of sour milk. To my surprise I saw only women tending these flocks. I asked about their husbands. They were gone away to work in Ghat, Fezzan, and other parts. Here were three or four adult women, and a few children, wandering solitarily in Open Desert! Not a habitation was near for many miles round! I could not help exclaiming, "Are you not afraid of robbers?" "No," replied an aged woman, "I have been here all my life, and shall die here. Why go away? What better shall I find in Mourzuk or Ghat? Can they give me more than milk? More than milk I care not for. And God is here as elsewhere!" Let the reader picture to his mind's eye, three or four lone females, with a child or two, wandering over a sandy plain, tending amongst a thinly-scattered forest of gum-acacia trees a few small goats, without a house or even a hut to sleep under, only the shade of a straw mat suspended in the prickly trees, and, then, repeat and mark well the truth of Pope's fine lines,—

"Order is heaven's first law, and this confess'd, Some are, and must be, greater than the rest,— More rich, more wise; but who infers from hence That such are happier, shocks all common sense."

Our people observed to me, "This is a country of the Sultan, so the women fear nothing." But the environs of Ghadames are the country of the Sultan, which does not prevent the depredations of banditti. There is no water here, they go to Agath to bring their water for themselves and their flocks. Of course, the complexion of these shepherdesses is quite brown or brown-black, by exposure to the weather. I shall ever remember the modest air with which a nomade young woman came and presented us with a bowl of milk. It was modesty's self's picture! The shepherdess nymph stepped forward timidly, with her eyes averted, not presuming even to look at us; and as soon as she placed the bowl on the ground, a short distance from us, she escaped to the thicket of the tholh-tree, like a young roe of the timid trembling herd. On her glowing cheek,—

"Sweet virgin modesty reluctant strove, While browsing goats at ease around her fed."

"And now she sees her own dear flock Beneath verdant boughs along the rock— And her innocent soul at the peaceful sight Is swimming o'er with a still delight."

Such a picture of pure heartfelt shyness and delicate modesty could only be witnessed in these solitudes, where this maiden shepherdess never perhaps speaks to any man but her own way-worn, severe, but honest-hearted father, when he returns from his little peregrinations, bringing a few blankets, a little barley and oil, the staple matters of existence for these lonely nomades. Nothing was given in return for the milk, for we had nothing to give. But if offered it would not have been accepted, by the laws of hospitality amongst these desert Arcadians. The reason now assigned for not giving us a kid, is, all the men are absent, and they cannot part with one, even if money be sent from Mourzuk for payment.

About 3 P.M., to my great joy, we arrived at the village of Agath. Our route was over a bare level plain, and our progress like at sea, when the masts of the ship are first seen, then the hull; so here we first saw the heads of the date-palms, then their trunks, and then the clusters of the hovels of the village. I was happy to learn our guide determined to pass the night here. The poor fellow was himself worn to a skeleton in travelling these wastes, with but one eye left, and that very dim. He was glad to "put up" for the night. When he started it was to have been a journey of a day and a half, it was now to be three days. We got into an empty hovel, and with palm-branches kindled a fire, which was kept up in a blaze to serve for a lamp. This is the usual practice, now and then putting on a piece of wood to make a light. Very few Saharans have the luxury of lamps or candles. I still suffered from bile, languor, and exhaustion, and once placed upon my mattress, I did not leave it till next morning. We had no provisions, for our party had eaten up all I had. We tried to get something from the Sheikh of the village, but only succeeded in obtaining a few loaves of newly-baked bread, with a little herb sauce, hot with peppers, to pour upon the bread to moisten it. Mustapha attempted to make a great noise, and talked about reporting him to the Pasha of Mourzuk, and getting him bastinadoed for treating a Christian in this way. I discouraged these threats, and would have no imbroglio, for I knew the character of the Sheikh could not well be worse than that of Mustapha himself. Mustapha demanded meat, but I begged only a little flour and butter to make some bazeen in the morning. The Sheikh promised and took leave. In the morning the Sheikh fled, and we saw no more of him. He deserved to be reported at Mourzuk. Hospitality certainly does not flourish at Agath. It's odd, the only time I was seriously ill, and really wanted hospitality, I found it not. To-day we picked off several fine pieces of gum from the tholh. Many of the trees had their branches lopped off, first for allowing the goats to nibble the green leaves, and afterwards to use the dry branches for firing.

FOOTNOTES:

[103] In the East Indies persons are known to become blind for the night, (something like the night-blindness, which we have before mentioned,) by the influence of the moon; or such is what people say.

[104] In the Koran it is intimated that God fattens the wicked in this world for the day of slaughter in the next. I forget the Surat. The Arabic is——signifying, "We (God) make them proceed by degrees;" that is to say, We, God, give the wicked pleasures and enjoyments in this world, that we may punish them the more in the next world. This is a most abominable sentiment, and intolerable to a right-thinking mind. But I believe such a blasphemous opinion has also been held by some mad-brained Christians.

[105] In the event of my publisher bringing out a new edition of the venerable Mrs. Glass, or Mrs. Rundall, I fervently hope he will not fail to avail himself of this receipt for the making of bazeen. I am also of the opinion of the former ancient dame, with regard to the necessity of catching a hare before it is dressed; and I think the meal likewise must be procured before it is made into bazeen. To be eaten with relish, it besides must be eaten in The Desert.

[106] The oath taken by the Knights of the Order of Malta, was—"To kill, or make the Mohammedans prisoners, for the glory of God."

[107] "And behold a man of Ethiopia, an eunuch of great authority under Candace, Queen of the Ethiopians, who had the charge of all her treasure, and had come to Jerusalem for worship."—(Acts viii. 27.)



CHAPTER XXV.

RESIDENCE AT MOURZUK.

Arrival at Mourzuk; and reported as a Christian Marabout from Soudan.—Meet Angelo, who conducts me to his Master, the British Vice-Consul.—Hearty Welcome from Mr. Gagliuffi.—Detail of the Slave-Caravans of The Wady.—Read the Newspapers; Massacre of Jemâ-el-Ghazouat, and the Annexation of Texas.—Visit to the Bashaw of Mourzuk.—Visits to the Commandant of the Garrison and the Kady.—Poetical Scrap of European Antiquity.—Celebration of a Wedding.—Environs of Mourzuk.—Camera Oscura.—Mourzuk Couriers.—The Kidnapped Circassian Officer.—Old Yousef, the Renegade.—Dine with the Greek Doctor on a Carnival Day.—An Albanian's Revenge.—Greece and its Diplomatists.—Officials of Mourzuk.—An Arab's estimate of God and Mahomet.—What is Truth?—Improvements of the Commandant of the Troops.—How English Politics taste in The Desert.—Visit to the Grave of Mr. Ritchie.

22nd.—ROSE early, and got off again as well as I could, considering I had had little or nothing to eat for the last two days, and should have nothing till the evening, when we expected to reach Mourzuk. Course east and south-east. Still cold and windy. Palms scattered over all the route, from Agath to Mourzuk, but only a few of them cultivated. It was most refreshing to behold so many trees on our road, after traversing such treeless and sandy wastes. A few wells here and there, and a little corn cultivation. Arrived at Mourzuk at about 4 P.M.

I here thought of a squib which had been published in a rival paper at Malta, representing me as "The Consul of the Blacks at Mourzuk" in allusion to and satirizing my anti-slavery propensities. These things will come back to one's memory years and years after they have been forgotten. When I read the squib, I little imagined I should ever visit Mourzuk, and yet the visit could be traced readily enough as resulting from my anti-slavery labours in Malta and the Mediterranean. Mustapha stopped at the gate to make his toilet, and I lent him my barracan to make on entering the city. Moors and all Saharan travellers dress themselves up before they enter any large or particular place, when on a journey, and they wonder why I do not follow their nice tidy example. On entering Mourzuk, I suppose I looked very queer, for it was immediately reported to the Bashaw, "A Christian Marabout is arrived from Soudan." We were stopped a few minutes at the gates, to see if I had any exciseable articles. This done, I made the best of my way to the residence of Mr. Gagliuffi. On the road I casually met the Maltese servant of the Vice-Consul. His face brightened up with joyful amazement, and he shook me eagerly by the hands. Englishmen arrive here once in half a century, or rather never, which sufficiently accounts for the excitement of the Maltese. Angelo took me direct to the Consul's house, and I found Mr. Gagliuffi at the door. The Consul was as astonished to see me as his servant. He stared at me as if I had just dropped from the clouds. He had heard of my going to Ghadames, Ghat, and Soudan, but did not expect to see me one while. I need not add, Mr. Gagliuffi gave me a most hearty welcome. I found the Consul in a very fine and spacious house for oases of Desert, with "all his English[108] comforts around him," as we say. Seven months had made me forget all these things, and I was now a Saharan entering into the domains of comfortable, if not civilized, life. The appearance of Mourzuk was not very pleasing to me, the major part of its dwellings being miserable hovels. The Castle looked dirty, and tumbling down. Nevertheless, the presence of Turkish troops and officers in uniform about the streets, with a variety of people congregated from different towns and districts of Sahara, gave the place more the aspect of a city than any other town I had seen since I left Tripoli. I was extremely knocked up and unwell, and at once determined not to leave Mourzuk until my health should be restored. I found myself right as to the date of my arrival at Mourzuk, on comparing notes with Mr. Gagliuffi; but two days wrong as to the name of the day, having written down Friday instead of Sunday. As to the Moorish reckoning of Ghat and Ghadames, that was quite different from the name of the day, and the number of the day, as found in Mourzuk. Time is very badly and incorrectly kept in The Sahara.

Some few particulars must now be recorded of the slave-caravans which I left in The Wady. The united number was some one hundred and thirty slaves. Two-thirds were females, and these young women or girls. There were a few children. Necessity teaches some of the best as well as the sternest lessons. A child of three years of age rode a camel alone, and without fear. The poor little creature knew if it complained or discovered itself frightened, it would be obliged to walk through The Desert. The slaves were fed in the morning with dates, and in the evening with ghusub. Female slaves, after the style of Aheer people, pounded the ghusub in a large wooden mortar, just before cooking. But they had little to eat, and were miserably fed, except those who had the good fortune to be purchased by Haj Ibrahim. For some of these improvident stupid merchants had actually purchased slaves without the means of keeping them. On arriving at The Wady, they sent jointly, through Haj Ibrahim, to borrow a hundred dollars of the Bashaw of Mourzuk. The messenger was Mustapha. His Highness kindly enough handed him over the money. All the masters carried a whip, but this was rarely used, except to drive them along the road, when they lagged from exhaustion. Thus it was administered at times when it could least be borne, when nature was sinking from fatigue and utter weariness! and therefore was cruel and inhuman. Yet only some twenty were sick, and two died. When very ill they were lashed upon the back of the camel. Some of the young women that had become favourites of their masters experienced a little indulgence. I observed occasionally love-making going on between the slaves, and some of the boys would carry wood for the girls. My servant Said had one or two black beauties under his protection. But everything was of the most innocent and correct character. Some groups of slaves were aristocratic, and would not associate with the others. Three young females under the care of the Shereef, assumed the airs and attitude of exclusives, and would not associate with the rest. Every passion and habit of civilized, is represented in savage life. A perfect democracy, in any country and state of society, is a perfect lie, and a leveller is a brainless fool. There is also an aristocracy in crime and in virtue, in demons and in angels. The slaves are clad variously. Haj Ibrahim tried to give every one of his a blanket or barracan, more or less large. Besides this, the females had a short chemise, and a dark-blue Soudan cotton short-sleeved frock. Many had only this frock. The poor creatures suffered more from the ignorant neglect of the Touaricks than the Tripoline merchants, and their complaints and diseases usually begin with their former masters. Yet I am assured by Mr. Gagliuffi, that the Touaricks of Aheer are infinitely better and kinder masters than the Tibboo merchants of Bornou, or even many Tripolines. The Tibboos cannot bring a female child over The Desert of the tender age of six or seven, without deflowering her, whilst the Touaricks of Aheer shudder at such sensual brutality, and even bring maidens to the market of an advanced age. The brutal Tibboos besides bring their slaves quite naked, with only a bit of leather or cotton wound round their loins, whilst the Touaricks always furnish them with some little clothing.

23rd.—Felt better, but weak. The excitement produced in me by my new quarters and reading the journals, after four months elapsing since I saw the last, made all the people fancy I was already attacked with their Mourzuk fever. Mr. Gagliuffi treated me as such, and the Greek doctor was sent for, who approved of my being treated as attacked, and I took accordingly fever powders. But another night's rest restored me and I discovered no symptoms of fever, for which I could not be too thankful, as the fever nearly attacks all strangers journeying in Mourzuk. The news from Europe was exceedingly disagreeable to me, inasmuch as I read of crimes and events of a much darker shade than the things which I had seen in Desert amongst the Barbarians. The two events which arrested my attention were the massacre of five hundred French troops near Jamâ El-Ghazouat, and the annexation of Texas, as most relating to my present pursuits. The first was an evident retribution for burning alive a tribe of Arabs in the caverns of the Atlas. Some high personages in Paris deplored this massacre of their devoted and hapless countrymen, but the poor Arabs of the Atlas, the men, women, and children burnt or suffocated alive, were unpitied and unmourned[109], because they happened to be resisting the placing of a foreign yoke on their necks. Such is the high tone of our political morality in Europe! No wonder the curse of God is upon us and afflicts us with famine and cholera! The annexation of Texas, for the extension of slavery and the slave trade, I hope will at once and for ever disabuse the minds of our wild democrats, who fancy that because people call themselves republicans and establish a republican form of government, therefore they are the friends of freedom. Better had America been bound hand and foot for ever to the aristocratic tyranny of the mother country, than that she should now become, as she is, the world's palladium of Negro slavery, and the huge breeding house of slaves to endless generations! We cannot but recommend to these trans-atlantic tramplers upon the freedom and rights of man, in defiance of all divine and human laws, the following lines of Mr. James—

"Oh, let them look to where in bonds, For help their bondsmen cry— Oh, let them look, ere British hands Wipe out that living lie.

"Veil, starry banner, veil your pride, The blood-red cross before— Emblem of that by Jordan's side Man's freedom price that bore, No land is strong that owns a slave, Vain is it wealthy, crafty, brave."

"The slaver's boastful thirst of gain, Tends but to break his bondsman's chain."

24th.—Much better in health to-day. Sent off Said, with a man of this place, to fetch my trunk and other baggage left in The Wady. Find Mr. Gagliuffi keeps up a friendly correspondence with the Vizier of the Sheikh of Bornou. Any one going to Bornou would derive great advantage from the Vice-Consul's letters of recommendation. Mr. Gagliuffi has also considerable influence over the population of Fezzan, and is on good terms with the Mourzuk Bashaw.

25th.—Felt well enough to-day to call upon the Bashaw. His Highness's full name and title is Hasan Bashaw Belazee. I was introduced to him by Mr. Gagliuffi, who previously insisted upon sprucing me up a bit, and removing my Maraboutish appearance by getting me a new red cap or fez. My Christian hat was left at Ghadames. It was impossible to wear it in Desert or towns, for people always said I looked like a Christian devil when I wore the European black hat. We found His Highness just recovered from a month's indisposition. He received us very politely, and Mr. Gagliuffi tells me he is really a very good sort of man. His Highness gave us pipes and tea, which is becoming now a favourite beverage amongst the Moors of East, as it has long been in West Barbary, amongst all races of the Maroquines, who have introduced the fashion of tea-drinking and teetotalism at Timbuctoo. His Highness was very talkative and affable. He was amazed at my audacity in going amongst the Touaricks without a single letter of recommendation, and looks upon my arrival at Mourzuk as an escape from death to life. His Highness confessed, however, that the Touaricks are people of one word, and that, after having told me they would protect me, I did right in confiding in their honour. He added, "If you go to Aheer hereafter I will assist you all I can." Mr. Gagliuffi pretends the Bashaw has considerable influence amongst all the Touarghee tribes, and the Touaricks always follow strictly the recommendations which the Bashaw, as governor of the province of Fezzan, and a near neighbour, has taken upon himself to give them. Every person carrying a letter from His Highness to the Touaricks, has invariably been well received. His Highness is very fond of illustrating his conversation by similes, and related a little facetious palaver which he had with a Targhee of Aheer.

His Excellency thus to the Targhee:—"You always thought there was a great mountain separating you from us, protecting you from our armies. You besides always boasted of having an army of 100,000 warriors. But the other day there came to you a bee, and buzzed about your ears, and you all at once fled before the little bee. How is this? Where are your 100,000 unconquerable heroes?"

The Targhee thus to the Bashaw:—"Ah, ah, how amazing! it was just so."

H. E.—"But are you not ashamed of yourselves?"

The Targhee.—"Ah, ah, but we shall now go and fight them."

H. E.—"Well, we shall see your courage."

The Bashaw explained to us, how the Touaricks of Aheer were put to flight by the Weled Suleiman, whom he the Bashaw, and his master at Tripoli, only esteemed as so many troublesome little bees. This was the affair of the capture of the 1000 camels, when the Touaricks were carrying off the spoils of a Tibboo village, before mentioned. These Weled Suleiman have just joined the rest of the refugees under the son of Abd-El-Geleel. The Bashaw is the famous Moorish commander who captured and beheaded Abd-El-Geleel, and who has sworn to extirpate not only the family of this Sheikh, but all the tribes subjected to his son. The Bashaw received the appointment of Bey or Bashaw of Fezzan, for his hatred to this family, and his services in capturing and destroying its chief. Belazee is a fresh-coloured Moor, and rather good-looking, with a dark, piercing, and cruel eye. He is about forty years of age and very stout. Of his courage there can be no question, and his reputation as a military man is very great in all this part of Sahara. Mr. Gagliuffi had instructed me diplomatically to boast of the attentions which I had received from the Touaricks, for observed the Consul, "If you say the Touaricks did not treat you well in every respect, the Bashaw will commiserate you before your face, but laugh at you behind your back, and tell his people how happy he is (and I'm sure he will be happy) you have been well fleeced by the Touaricks, of whom the Turks here are jealous in the extreme." Mr. Gagliuffi also volunteered a diplomatic hit of another kind on his own account: "My friend, your Excellency, on entering the gates of Mourzuk, and looking up at the Castle, thought he was entering a town of the dead, it looked so horribly dingy and desolate." I said to the Consul afterwards, "Why did you say so?" He replied, "I am trying my utmost to improve the city, and want the Bashaw to whitewash the Castle. He has promised me he will do it." The Bashaw addressed me, "Think yourself lucky you have escaped, but for the future you must be placed in the hands of the Touaricks by us as a sacred deposit, and then if anything wrong happens we shall demand you of all the Touaricks by force." I thanked him for the compliment; I believe he meant what he said at the time. But such an insulting message could not be delivered to the brave, chivalric, and freeborn sons of the Touarghee deserts; they would trample your letter under their feet, or spear it with their spears.

Mr. Gagliuffi and myself then went to see the troops exercised. The commanding officer is trying to reduce them to order and discipline, and succeeds admirably. Before he arrived, great disorder reigned amongst them, and they were constantly found intoxicated in the streets. After the manuvring, we visited the commander and his staff, who were all extremely polite. The Bashaw does not interfere with the discipline of the army. The Turks can well distinguish, if they please, between civil and military affairs. And it is wrong to consider the Turkish Government and people, like Prussia and other military nations of the north, as one great military camp. We afterwards visited the Kady, Haj Mohammed Ben Abd-Deen, an intimate friend of the Consul. He had under his care the Denham and Clapperton caravan, and is well acquainted with us English. I was surprised to find the Kady quite black, although his features were not altogether Negro. Mr. Gagliuffi says Mourzuk is the first Negro country. This statement, however, involves a very difficult question. Fezzan, Ghat, and other oases, contain many families of free Negroes, some perhaps settled formerly as merchants, and others the descendants of freed slaves. I do not think the real black population begins until we reach the Tibboos, although Ghatroun is mostly inhabited by Negroes. Certainly, the Negroes have never emigrated farther north in colonies. Mr. Gagliuffi has just received by the courier from Tripoli, several watches sent there for repair, belonging to the Sheikh of Bornou. They were given to the Sheikh by our Bornou expedition, twenty years ago. It is pleasing to see with what care the watches have been preserved in Central Africa, for they looked as good as new.