hut; on so doing, we there saw his wife, who was distinguished by very
long nails tinged red and yellow with henna. He is the most considerable
merchant of this neighbourhood, and trades principally with Makada or
Habesch; his tokul, here also called Baid (house), was dark, as all the
light it had came in at the door, but was elegantly arranged in its way.
Tables and seats were of well-made wicker-work from Abyssinia. Ostrich
eggs were hung round, and the whole way round the tokul was a row of
wine bottles placed close to each other as ornaments. Here we had again
to eat, but we could hardly get a piece down, on which coffee was
produced, which, from the perfumes used in its preparation, had a most
peculiar though not unpleasant taste. He told us much of their habits
and customs; such as, that the son of the ruling Sheik retained that
title even when he was not elected on his father’s death by the tribe,
and received a third part of the revenue from the newly chosen Sheik;
that the Faki did not accompany the tribe to battle. Here, too, the
higher women colour their eyelids with antimony. Sheik Jacob confirmed
what Mussa had already told us, that he had twice killed a lion with a
lance, while the latter was moving off slowly with a calf in his jaws,
and that he did not drop it when Mussa attacked him. The Sheik held that
the king of beasts was ashamed of his theft, although he had no fear for
himself. We were told that the elephants had twice nearly destroyed the
whole village, because the holes dug in the gohr, which also served them
as drinking-places, had been filled up by sand drifted by the wind. One
elephant, on the occasion, had eaten too much durra, and drunk copiously
of water, and had been left behind dead. We wandered about the village
and came on a house of Mohammed Ehle’s, who, though standing at his
door, did not invite us in, but only saluted us. He was vexed and his
pride was offended, because we had not visited him first of all. Some
Schaigies, who stood near, joked Mohammed Ehle on it, blaming him for
not showing us the usual civilities. As neither Mussa nor Jacob had
placed any merissa before us, for, being Faki, they neither drink it nor
smoke tobacco, though they snuff it, we asked the former where this
Æthiopian drink was to be procured. On this he led us to a concealed hut
in a distant corner, and here we found a merry party, Melek Mahmud
presiding. The fat Mohammed el Chamuss (Buffalo), who owes the epithet
to his corpulence, was so far gone in drunkenness, that in rising to
welcome us he fell, but continued by his humour and wit to highly amuse
the party, at the expense of the Turks. We afterwards saw a funeral; the
corpse was rolled up in two pieces of cotton cloth and borne on the
shoulders; men with shields and lances followed it, and behind them came
the wife and female attendants. She was of very voluptuous build, held a
cloth in her hands; with most furious howling, she waved it over her
head, ever and anon striking her naked breast. She, like the other women
and girls, conducted themselves as if insane, grasping handfuls of sand,
casting it in the air, on their heads, and on all around. But in spite
of this outward inconsolable state, we observed that not a tear was to
be seen in her eyes, or in any of the other women’s.
A chasua had been made into the hills of Basa; the troops returned,
bringing a crowd of prisoners of both sexes with them. The males were
almost all wounded, and exhibited much stoicism during the painful
operation of extracting the balls, which my brother performed. Even the
Turks confessed that these mountaineers had defended themselves bravely
with stones and lances. Many of the soldiers were also wounded, and with
balls, which they in their usual blundering had fired into each other.
It was, however, Turk-like asserted, that the Mograbin and Schaigies
knowingly and wilfully had here and there fired on the soldiers, to
drive them from the booty. It was a piteous sight to behold the
prisoners, especially the women and children, brought into the camp
bound on camels, despair written on their countenances. Before these
were sold or distributed by lot, they were taken near the tent of
Topschi Baschi, where a fire was burning, in which were iron stamps in
the form of a star, heated red hot, to brand all of them with on the
shoulder, even to the smallest child. No sooner did the howling and
weeping reach our hut than, starting up, we seized our rifles, and with
three servants were off to hunt. In spite of all our warnings, these
would not remain with us, and we were much enraged on hearing three
shots fired; we went up to the spot, supposing it to be our servants,
but instead of them we found three soldiers, who lay on the ground
bathed in their blood, and fearfully torn. Two were already dead, and
the third, who yet lived, though his whole belly was torn out, told us,
that a lion had attacked them. On hearing the shots, our servants had
hurried up, and were now sent back to the camp with the survivor, though
my brother had no hopes of saving him. The Pascha no sooner heard this,
than with Soliman Kaschef and his body-guard he mounted to pursue the
lion, and I accompanied him with my hunter Sale, my brave lad from
Mahass, who afterwards followed me to the White Nile, to show him the
place and the visible track. Arrived there, the Turks galloped on, and I
and Sale remained alone behind. I heard a heavy tread and the breaking
down of bushes, and saw near me an elephant with its young. Sale, who
was some distance from me, and had just shot a parrot, called to me,
asking, if he was to fire at the elephant, which I loudly forbade. The
beast went on close past me, crushing down the bushes: I saw its high
back, and took up a secure position between some Dom-palms which,
springing from one root, stood so close together, that the elephant from
its size could not push in to me. Sale, in the meantime, was up a tree,
and told me that the elephant had turned and was making its way back to
the Chaaba. The monster seemed to be enraged, but still alarmed for its
young one; for we found a long track on the ground where it had with its
tusks as with a plough turned up the soil. Some shots were heard, and we
fancied the lion had been tracked; but it proved to be the Pascha and
his mounted followers, who had seen the elephant. A mounted messenger
now galloped into camp, and in a moment the Arnaut Abdin Bey with some
of his people came up. The elephant, finding itself saluted from all
sides by a shower of balls, now charged here now there on the riders,
who fired at it and as quickly as possible wheeled off. Aim as far as
possible was taken at the eye, and ere long it was evident it was
blinded, as in its mad charges on its foes it dashed against the palm-
trees till the fruit fell in showers from them. All dismounted, and a
narrower circle was formed round the elephant. It must have by this time
received some hundred balls, and the ground it staggered over was dyed
red, when the Pascha crept up to it, and, kneeling down, sent a ball
into the right eye, on which the colossal creature fell backwards and
expired. No traces could be found of the young one, and as little of the
lion. However, some days after and close to the camp, in which one often
at night heard the lions roaring, a large male lion, without a mane, was
shot by the followers of Soliman Kaschef.
We now got some sad news. Our hunter Abdallah, who from his unusual
bravery we highly cherished, had a good while before, at his own express
wish, marched with the Schaigie chief Melek Ada to Beni Amer, to shoot
wild beasts for us, and inquire into other matters in that land. We had
provided him with one of our best camels, a double-barrelled flint gun,
powder, lead, and a considerable sum of money, to enable him to purchase
giraffes. He had collected a good number of birds and other curiosities,
when he resolved on joining us with what he had. Disregarding the advice
of Melek Ada, as he himself afterwards told us, Abdallah would not await
the recal of the detachment, but, without escort or companion, commenced
his journey back. He had got safely through the lands of our foes, and
reached those of the Hallenga; but near Arbre, three hours’ journey from
here, he was slain. There he was found, recognised as our hunter, and
the intelligence spread in the camp by the Hallenga themselves. The
Pascha at once sent out people to inquire after our property; and our
man Sale, who went with them, found his dear friend lying with his belly
cut open. He openly asserted that this murder was committed by the
Hallenga. Of Abdallah’s property and packages not a feather was to be
found, although he was known to have carried two cases of stuffed birds
with him. We suspected Mohammed Ehle, and were strengthened in our
suspicions, as ere long a yet more horrid accident occurred. Ali, a
nephew of Mohammed Din, and the friend who had protected us on our visit
to the Great Sheik, and accompanied us back into the camp, had, with two
other young relatives, visited his uncle, and ourselves, here. The
Pascha had not deigned to notice him, and he was much cast down about
the sad fate of his near relative Mohammed Din. Although the latter was
ill, and the Pascha had forbidden my brother access to him, still we
resolved from humane feeling to pay him a visit. Unquestioned, we passed
the guard, and found the unhappy man, who had been deprived of his
angareb, lying on the bare, damp earth, in an old, dirty ferda; two
thick posts had been driven into the ground, to which he was chained
heavily, and in a way more fitting a wild beast than a man. He would
take no medicine from my brother, as he feared poison; we could not,
indeed, understand his Aggem, but his words as translated to us implied
that he was ready to die for his race, and even by the fearful death of
impalement, with which the Pascha threatened him. Towards evening, the
three young men had started on their homeward journey. Next morning we
had gone out very early on the hunt, and ere we went far saw thousands
of birds hovering in the sky, and too truly foreboding the horrible fate
of our acquaintances. We went to the spot over which the birds hovered
in greatest numbers, and found, some half hour’s journey from the camp,
the three corpses, lying in their blood, most fearfully disfigured and
mutilated. The bloody lances, and the quantity of blood round, showed
that our friends had bravely defended themselves, but they offered a
horrible spectacle, their eyes having been already picked out by the
birds. That this murder was committed by order of the Pascha admitted of
little doubt in our minds, and therefore it behoved us to bring
punishment on him for it. We laid the three corpses on a camel feeding
near, and I accompanied them into camp and to the Pascha’s presence. I
commenced as accuser against the Hallenga, and bitterly reproached them
for such a breach of hospitable duties; but the Pascha, without any look
of surprise or displeasure, answered with a mere “Min ara di?” (Who
knows it?) accompanied by a meaning look at me, and then, by a sign,
ordered the removal of the corpses, without exchanging another word with
me. General pity was felt in the camp for the murdered, and even among
the feelingless Turks there was much excitement, when Mohammed Ehle,
with a small train, entered to pay his respects to the Pascha, or inform
him of his villanous treachery. As at first the Pascha did not speak to
him, which probably my presence might account for, he, according to
Turkish etiquette, had to remain silent, and afterwards, as we were at
the same time leaving the divan, I, before all his people, bitterly
reproached him. This he bore in silence, as if he was the guilty party,
and in his own village of Hauathi the same was openly asserted by our
friends. The Albanian Abdin Bey was so enraged, that it was only by the
united persuasions of the other officers that he was prevented from
mounting, along with his wild Albanians, and overtaking and cutting down
Mohammed Ehle; this, had it occurred, would more likely have brought on
a general revolt against the Pascha himself, as the soldiers have been
long loudly murmuring at his ill treatment of them as regards food and
pay. Mohammed Ehle had before this, in a battle with the Haddenda,
received a lance wound right through the outer part of the breast,
directly over the midriff. The Pascha had expressed a wish that my
brother should operate on him, but Joseph did not admire this practice,
and had recourse to washing it with opium. When the pious Sheik, from
its smell, recognised opium, he would no longer submit to the treatment,
because opium in no shape must find its way into the sainted body of a
Faki. So my brother let him and his wound, which had already become an
ulcer, alone; he had hoped to have healed it by sympathetic means.
In our hunting excursions, we often visited Hauathi, as merissa was to
be got there, which was not allowed to be introduced or brewed in the
camp. The women of the upper orders pass the whole day on their
angarebs, and do not busy themselves in any way; they anoint their
bodies, and wear glass coral, and some real coral in its rough state,
round their necks and wrists, as well as silver and horn rings on the
latter, the ankles, and above the elbows; silver rings on the fingers
and both thumbs, a small silver ring in their right nostril, and in
their ears golden plates. Their hair lies in small plaited knots close
to the head, but one never sees on it the white pomade made from camels’
fat, so common on the men’s. Each house had a hollow in the floor,
covered with hoops and a cloth, in which the women squat down on their
heels and smoke their pipes; they also smear their face, and necks to
their shoulders, with musk; the men do the same to their necks, so as to
conceal the disagreeable specific smell that the skins of all these dark
races emit. We also hit here upon an establishment where the men had
their hair frizzed out after the prevailing fashion before mentioned.
Instead of a comb a piece of pointed wood was used, which they often
leave sticking in the hair, so that it may serve to scratch the head
with. Such a frizzing-out requires many hours’ labour, and with the
women it often takes up a whole day, as their hair is very stiff and
difficult to arrange. The women carry very heavy burdens on their heads,
and move under them with much grace and activity, nor did we observe any
deformity among them.
We paid a visit to the Chawaga Mohammed, a respected and, in his way,
well-informed merchant: he confirmed to us what the fiery milkmaid of
Mohammed Ehle, by name Fatme, had reported in the camp, that our friend
Mussa, who had been most shamefully defamed by Ehle to the Pascha, had
shut himself up in his tokul, to starve himself to death. For four days
he had been shut up in his dark hut without any nourishment, and
threatened to stab with his lance any one who came near its door. We
held it to be our duty to dissuade him from this determination, and so
went to his house. Here all were in deep sorrow, and we were warned not
to go near the tokul, as the Sheik was a brave man, who would keep his
word. This however did not alarm us, nor prevent our going up to the
door and begging admittance, saying we wished before his death, which we
declared a manly one, to take our leave of him. It was the work of some
hours, during which we sat in the shade of the recuba, to get the
miserable man to answer us. At length, however, after we had stoutly
abused both Turks and Mohammed Ehle, he cried out that all should retire
save we alone, and cautiously opening with his lance the door, admitted
us, and again locked it behind him, so that only a very little light
came in through its crevices. We embraced and kissed the brave old man,
who wept that it was the last time he would behold us. We pretended to
be about to leave him; my brother telling him he carried drops about
with him, which did he take he would avoid all the tortures of the death
by starvation he seemed resolved on. I still see the man, with shaking
knees, leaning on his lance, and gazing on my brother, as he dropped on
sugar, from a phial, some liquid anodyne. Mussa let his lance fall,
seized us both by the hands, and begged my brother to stick the sugar in
his mouth. Instead of the instantaneous hoped for effect, he found his
love of life awakened; and my brother plainly told him that he now would
live fourteen days, although he took neither food nor drink. This did
not at all please him, and he grew angry. I saw, through a crevice, that
food was prepared for us in the recuba, and begged him to let us eat our
meal. My brother held him persuasively in his embrace, and as the Sheik
opened the door, I drew the angareb into the doorway, under the pretext
that we would eat in his presence; he began to yield a little, said we
had acted ill towards him, in forcing him yet to live fourteen days.
After some remonstrance, he took a little milk, and gave up his purpose
of dying. No sooner did his family and the merchant Mohammed remark his
drinking from the distance, than they rushed up to him, and embraced
him. I afterwards told all this to the Pascha, who gave me an assurance
that nothing to harm or annoy the Sheik should happen. The people, who
had heard of this wonderful medicine, now came about us, and would have
some of it. My brother, who well knew the greed of these Arabs, told
them first to bring honey and butter into the camp; on this they hurried
off as fast as they had come, but, as usual, brought us nothing.
The Aggem, or language of Taka, has no means of counting over the
thousand, and by this is therefore often meant much more. Mabuck and
Abba mean father; Oho, merissa; el Dura, honey and water as drink; Eüm,
water; Tohscha, Toschi, flesh; Dahanita, Good day; Dabaiakn, How goes
it? Tiah, milk; Ola, butter; Thau, honey; Otamm, bread; an Harguab, I am
hungry; an Guib, I am thirsty; Ohàtta, horse; Okamm, camel; Omir, ass;
Ditock, mother; Sannock, brother, &c. This language has great similarity
with that of the Bischari, and like it is very widely spread, and to be
viewed as the original language of the old foes of Egypt. Whether the
words of Arabic occurring in it have been introduced by the Arabs, or
are an original part of the language, cannot well be decided.
In the stalls of the cows in milch were always some stuffed skins, taken
from the slain calves, stuffed and placed there, that the cows at the
sight of their sucklings might yield their milk. The Hallenga possess
many suits of chain armour (labbis) and good straight swords; the first
however they only now use in their forays upon their foes about here, as
these would not protect them from musket-balls. Their food is chiefly
milk and asside (meal soup); in such meat dishes as they have, they put
so much of a small red pepper (schiteta) that an European can hardly eat
them. They ascribe curious powers to this schiteta. They eat, in
defiance of the Koran, the tortoise, as well as the hog, and also the
locust or grasshopper, from which they tear off the wings, and then
roast it in the fire. The shells of the tortoise and of many small
mussels they use as dishes and spoons. They have neither wheat nor
maize, although the ground is well adapted to them. The merry-makings on
marriage often last a month, when the bridegroom is rich, or has a
number of relatives. Hides are used as cradles, which are suspended like
hammocks on cords, and swung about. These are hung from trees, in the
open air, as are also skins filled with milk, and in them, by shaking,
butter is produced.
One day, when we were with the Pascha, he gave my brother directions to
professionally visit the sick Faki Mahommed of Kadmin, a man held in
high esteem by all. He, the head of all the priesthood in Hallenga, was
now very old, and had no special liking to pay his respects to the
Pascha; besides, he might also have been offended, the Pascha having
laid his village, where alone the Faki may dwell, under contribution,—a
thing even Defterdar Bey had not ventured on. We learned from a Faki,
who had accompanied the army from Chartum, that this Faki-el-Kebir had
sworn not to behold the sun-light, as long as the Turks darkened the
land. Accompanied by a servant, we mounted our asses, and started for
the Faki village, some half-hour’s journey distant; we must have been
spied out when some way from it, for we found many of these holy men
assembled, who would have denied us entrance into it, as no laity were
permitted to tread its sacred soil. However, on our unslinging our guns,
they disappeared in all haste; but on our calling out and asking where
the great Faki dwelt, two of them turned and showed us to his abode. We
entered a roomy recuba, where many young girls of considerable beauty
and bright colour were occupied weaving straw mats. From the entrance-
hall we came to a tokul, and through this to another, where the old man
lay on an angareb, reading by dull lamp-light. I, however, returned at
once into the entrance-hall, both for the sake of the purer air, and
more agreeable company, the latter of which our sudden entrance much
surprised. My brother remained conversing a considerable time with the
old man, who told him many things, and could not conceal his hatred of
the Turks; he had been many years in Mecca and Medina,—had, according to
his own expression, learnt every thing, and called himself Allan
(learned). When my brother questioned him as to his ailments, he at once
loudly declared he would take no medicine from any surgeon of the
Pascha’s, not because he mistrusted my brother, as he before now had in
Djedda had for his friend a Frank doctor, but merely because he would
not be indebted to the Pascha for any thing whatever. When my brother
recommended him to move into a better atmosphere, as the air in the dark
tokul was very detrimental to health, he replied, that after sunset and
before sunrise he continued his devotions in the open air.