On the 1st of October, at half past five in the morning we left Gerri,

the Acaba continuing on the east and west, but the two extremities

curving like a bow or an amphitheatre. This ridge of mountains is

composed of bare, red stone, without any grass. At ten minutes after

eight we changed our road to N. E. endeavouring to turn the point of

the Acaba about three miles off, and at ten o'clock alighted among

green trees to feed our camels. At three o'clock in the afternoon we

left our resting-place in the wood. The mountains, which were then on

our left hand, are those of the Acaba of Gerri; but those on the right

still ran parallel to our course, and ended in the Acaba of Morness:

we were now two miles from the river, its course due north. About

twenty minutes past four we came to the Acaba of Morness, a ridge of

bare, stony hills, and half an hour after we passed it. There is very

little ascent, and the road is only loose, broken stones, which last

about a quarter of an hour.

At six o'clock in the evening we came to Hajar el Assad, or Hajar

Serrareek, the first signifying the Lion's Stone, the next the Stone

of Thieves, a beggarly, straggling village, where there is a sakia,

and small stripes of dora, as if sown in a garden, and watered from

the well at pleasure. Hajar el Assad is the boundary between Wed Ageeb

and the Mek of Chendi; it is a yellow stone set upon a rock, which

they imagine has the figure of a lion. We now alighted near half a

mile from the river, in a small plain, where was only one shepherd

with his cot and flock. At some distance, near the river, there was a

house or two with sakies. September is the seed-time in this country.

When the Nile is at its height, the flat ground along the side of

the water, which is about a quarter of a mile broad, is sown with

dora, as far as water can be conducted in rills to it, but after this

short space, the ground rises immediately; there the harvest-time

is in November; and the seed-time at Sennaar is in July, and their

harvest in September; both regulated by the height of the Nile at the

respective places.

On the 2d of October, at half past five in the morning we left Hajar

el Assad; for the two last days past our journey lay through woods

and desert, without water or villages; we rested upon the Nile,

which soon receded from us. After having gone about two miles we

saw some small houses and sakies, with narrow stripes of corn on

both sides of the river. About a mile further, we began, instead of

the sandy desert, to see large stratums of purple, red and white

marble, and also alabaster. It seems as if those immense quarries,

which run into Upper Egypt 10° N. from this, first take their rise

here. This day we journied through woods of acacia and jujebs. At

twenty minutes past eight we alighted in a wood to feed our camels.

The sun was so immoderately hot that we could not travel. The Nile

from Gerri declines almost insensibly from the E. of N. The whole

country is desert and without inhabitants, saving the banks of the

river; for there are here no regular rains that can be depended upon

at any certain time for the purpose of agriculture; only there fall

violent showers at the time the sun is in the zenith, on his progress

southward from the tropic of Cancer towards the Line, and the grass

grows up very luxuriantly in all the spots watered by these accidental

showers; but all the rest of the country is dry and burnt up.

Near Gerri, a little north, is the large rock Acaba, full of caves,

the first habitations of the builders of Meroë. A little below it is

the ferry over which those who go by the west side of the Nile to

Dongola, through the desert of Bahiouda, must all pass. It is five

days journey before you come to Korti, where travellers arrive the

morning of the sixth, that is, going at the rate of fifteen miles

a-day. Near Korti you again meet the Nile, which has taken a very

unnatural turn from Magiran, or where it meets the Tacazzè from

Angot. The way through this desert, which was that of Poncet, is now

rendered impassable, as I have already said, by the Beni Faisara,

Beni Gerar, and Cubba-beesh Arabs, three powerful clans, which come

from the westward near Kordofan from fear of the black horse there,

and which have taken possession of all the wells in that desert, so

that it is impossible for travellers to avoid them. The Cubba-beesh

are so called, from kebsh[46], a sheep, because they wear the skin

of that animal for cloathing. They are very numerous, and extend far

into the great desert Selima and to the frontiers of Egypt. These

tribes have cut off the last three caravans coming from Dongola and

Egypt. This ferry, and the Acaba beyond it, belongs to Wed Ageeb;

and here all goods, passing to and from Egypt, Dongola, and Chendi,

pay a duty, which is not regulated as to its extent, but is levied

arbitrarily, according to circumstances of the times, and paid to the

Shukorea, or other Arabs, who are in the neighbourhood, which happens

from February to July. The Mek, or prince of the Arabs, passes them

by fair means or force. After the rains become constant, these go

eastward to Mendera and Gooz, and then the road from Sennaar to Suakem

through these places becoming dangerous on account of all the other

Arabs assembling there to avoid the fly, the caravan of Suakem is

obliged to pass through Halfaia to Barbar, and from thence to Suakem,

so that this was the most frequented road in the kingdom. Now, indeed,

the communications on all sides are obstructed by the anarchy that

prevails among the Arabs, so that he who passes to or from Egypt must

depend solely upon his own exertions and the protection of Heaven.

The Acaba of Gerri, and the banks of the Nile there, are inhabited

by tribes of Arabs, called Beni Hamda, and Hassani. They are all

poor and miserable banditti, and would not suffer a man to pass

there at the ferry were it not for the extraordinary dread they have

of fire-arms. The report of a gun, even at a distance, will make a

hundred of them fly and hide themselves. We gave them several vollies

of blunderbusses, and double-barrelled guns, fired in the air, from

the time of our entering their territory till near Wed Baal a Nagga;

we saw them upon the tops of the pointed rocks as far distant as we

could wish, nor did they ever appear nearer us, or descend into the

plain.

At Halfaia and Gerri begins that noble race of horses justly

celebrated all over the world. They are the breed that was introduced

here at the Saracen conquest, and have been preserved unmixed to this

day. They seem to be a distinct animal from the Arabian horse, such

as I have seen in the plains of Arabia Deserta, south of Palmyra

and Damascus, where I take the most excellent of the Arabian breed

to be, in the tribe of Mowalli and Annecy, which is about lat. 36°;

whilst Dongola and the dry country near it seems to be the center of

excellence for this nobler animal, so that the bounds within which the

horse is in its greatest perfection seems to be between the degrees

of lat. 20°, and 36°, and between long. 30° east from the meridian of

Greenwich to the banks of the Euphrates. For this extent Fahrenheit's

thermometer is never below 50° in the night, or in the day below 80°,

though it may rise to 120° at noon in the shade, at which point horses

are not affected by the heat, but will breed as they do at Halfaia,

Gerri, and Dongola, where the thermometer rises to these degrees.

These countries, from what has been said, must of course be a dry,

sandy desert, with little water, producing short, or no grass, but

only roots, which are blanched like our cellery, being always covered

with earth, having no marshes or swamps, fat soapy earth, or mould.

I never heard of wild horses in any of these parts. Arabia Deserta,

where they are said to be, seems very ill calculated to conceal them,

it being flat without wood or cover, they must therefore be constantly

in view; and I never heard any person of veracity say they ever saw

wild horses in Arabia. Wild asses I have frequently seen alive,

but never dead, in neck, head, face, and tail very like ours, only

their skins are streaked, not spotted. The zebra is found nowhere in

Abyssinia, but in the S. W. extremity of Kuara among the Shangalla

and Guba, in Narea and Caffa, and in the mountains of Dyre and Tegla,

and to the southward near as far as the Cape.

What figure the Nubian breed would make in point of fleetness is

very doubtful, their make being so entirely different from that of

the Arabian; but if beautiful and symmetrical parts, great size and

strength, the most agile, nervous, and elastic movements, great

endurance of fatigue, docility of temper, and seeming attachment to

man, beyond any other domestic animal, can promise any thing for a

stallion, the Nubian is, above all comparison, the most eligible in

the world. Few men have seen more horses, or more of the different

places where they are excellent, than I have, and no one ever more

delighted in them, as far as the manly exercise went. What these may

produce for the turf is what I cannot so much as guess, as there is

not, I believe, in the world one more indifferent to, or ignorant of,

that amusement than I am. The experiment would be worth trying in any

view. The expence would not be great, yet there might be some trouble

and application necessary, but, if adroitly managed, not much even of

that.

I could not refrain from attempting a drawing of one of them, which

I since, and but very lately, unfortunately mislaid. It was a horse

of Shekh Adelan, which with some difficulty I had liberty to draw.

It was not quite four years old, was full 16 hands high: I mean this

only as an idea; I know the faults of my drawing, and could correct

many of them; but it is a rule I have invariably adhered to in this,

as well as in description, to correct nothing from recollection when

the object is out of my sight. This horse's name was El Fudda, the

meaning of which I will not pretend to explain. In Egypt this is the

name of a small piece of money clipped into points, otherwise called

a parat; but, very probably, the name of horses in Nubia may have

as little allusion to the quality of the animal as the name which

our race-horses have in England; they are, however, very jealous

in keeping up their pedigree. All noble horses in Nubia are said

to be descended of one of the five upon which Mahomet and his four

immediate successors, Abou Becr, Omar, Atman, and Ali, fled from

Mecca to Medina, the night of the Hegira. From which of these El

Fudda was descended I did not inquire; Shekh Adelan, armed, as he

fought, with his coat of mail and war saddle, iron-chained bridle,

brass cheek-plates, front-plate, breast-plate, large broad-sword, and

battle-ax, did not weigh less upon the horse than 26 stone, horseman's

weight. This horse kneeled to receive his master, armed as he was,

when he mounted, and he kneeled to let him dismount armed likewise,

so that no advantage could be taken of him in those helpless times

when a man is obliged to arm and disarm himself piece by piece on

horseback. Adelan, in war, was a fair-player, and gave every body his

chance. He was the first man always that entered among the enemy,

and the last to leave them, and never changed this horse. The horses

of Halfaia and Gerri do not arrive at the size of those in Dongola,

where few are lower than 16 hands. They are black or white, but a vast

proportion of the former to the latter. I never saw the colour we call

grey, that is, dappled, but there are some bright bays, or inclining

to sorrel. They are all kept monstrously fat upon dora, eat nothing

green but the short roots of grass that are to be found by the side

of the Nile, after the sun has withered it. This they dig out where it

is covered with earth, and appears blanched, which they lay in small

heaps once a-day on the ground before them. They are tethered by the

fetlock joint of the foreleg with a very soft cotton rope made with

a loop and large button. They eat and drink with the bridle in their

mouth, not the bridle they actually use when armed, but a light one

made on purpose to accustom them to eat and drink with it: If you ask

the reason, they tell you of many battles that have been lost by the

troops having been attacked by their enemy when taking off the bridles

to give their horses drink. No Arab ever mounts a stallion; on the

contrary, in Nubia they never ride mares; the reason is plain: The

Arabs are constantly at war with their neighbours, (for so robbery in

that country is called) and always endeavour to take their enemies by

surprise in the grey of the evening, or the dawn of day. A stallion no

sooner smells the stale of the mare in the enemy's quarters, than he

begins to neigh, and that would give the alarm to the party intended

to be surprised. No such thing ever can happen when they ride mares

only; on the contrary, the Funge trust only to superior force. They

are in an open, plain country, must be discovered at many miles

distance, and all such surprises and stratagems are useless to them.

The place where we alighted is called Hajar el Dill, and is a

mile east from where we halted in the wood to feed our camels. We

continued along the Nile at about a mile's distance from it, and,

after advancing near three miles, came in sight of a large village

called Derreira; on the opposite side of the Nile, and beyond that,

about four miles on the same side, is Deleb, a large village, with

the shrine of a famous saint of that name. The country here is more

cultivated and pleasant than that which we had passed; there is a low

ridge of hills in the way. At half past six in the evening of the

2d of October we arrived at Wed Baal a Nagga. The village is a very

large one, belonging to a Fakir, a saint of the first consideration in

the government of Chendi. All this country, except immediately upon

the Nile, is desert and sandy. All along the plain we saw numbers

of people digging pits, and taking out the earth, which they boil

in large earthen vases or pans. This is the only way they procure

themselves salt, of which they send great quantities to Halfaia, where

is a market, and from whence it is sent to Sennaar.

On the 3d, at five o'clock, we left Wed Baal a Nagga, and continued

along the Nile, which is about a quarter of a mile off; and seven

miles further to the N. E. we passed a tomb of the Fakir el Deragi,

close to the road on our left hand. All from Wed Baal a Nagga, on both

sides of the Nile, is picturesque and pleasant, full of verdure, and

varied with houses in different situations till we come to the tomb

of this Fakir. Immediately from this all is bare and desolate, except

one verdant spot by the side of the river, shaded with fine trees, and

full of herbage, and there we alighted at nine o'clock. This place is

called Maia; a few trees appear on the other side, but beyond these

all the country is desert. It is inhabited at present by the Jaheleen

Arabs of Wed el Faal; as they have had violent showers in the high

country, and their pools were still full of water, they staid by them

longer than ordinary feeding their cattle. Idris Wed el Faal, governor

of Chendi, nephew to Wed Ageeb, and son to Sittina his sister, to

whom this country belongs, was then with them, so we did not fear

them, otherwise there is not a worse set of fanatical wretches, or

greater enemies to the name of Christian, than these are.

As we are here speaking of Arabs and their names, I shall once for

all observe, that Wed, a word which I have frequently made use of

in the course of this history, and which in this sense is peculiar

to the kingdom of Sennaar, does not mean river, though that is its

import in Arabic. Here it is an abbreviation of Welled, peculiar to

the inhabitants of this part of Atbara, who seem to have an aversion

to the letter l; Wed el Faal, the son of Faal; Wed Hydar, the son of

Hydar, or _the lion_; Wed Hassan, the son of Hassan, and so of the

rest. For the same reason, Melek Sennaar, the king of Sennaar, called

_Mek_, by throwing out the l; Abd el Mek, the slave of the king,

instead of Abd el Melek. Here also I had the pleasure to find the

language of the Koran that of the whole people in common conversation;

and as this was the book in which I first studied the Arabic, I found

now a propriety and facility of expression I had not been sensible of

before; for that of the Koran, in Arabia, is a kind of dead language,

rarely understood but by men of learning.

At Wed Baal a Nagga there is a ferry for those who go to Dongola by

the desert of Bahiouda. Derreira is the landing-place on the other

side; I suppose it is to avoid these Jaheleen that caravans ferry over

at Gerri rather than come so low as Wed Baal a Nagga. We left Maia at

half past three in the afternoon, and, after going three miles, we

came to Gooz, a small village on our left, where we found plenty of

good food for our camels. At six we alighted at Fakari. Chendi was

now five miles east of us, where we arrived at eight o'clock in the

morning of the 4th of October.

CHAP. XI.

_Reception at Chendi by Sittina--Conversations with her--Enter

the Desert--Pillars of moving Sand--The Simoom--Latitude of

Chiggre._

Chendi, or Chandi, is a large village, the capital of its district,

the government of which belongs to Sittina, (as she is called) which

signifies the Mistress, or the Lady, she being sister to Wed Ageeb,

the principal of the Arabs in this country. She had been married, but

her husband was dead. She had one son, Idris Wed el Faal, who was

to succeed to the government of Chendi upon his mother's death, and

who, in effect, governed all the affairs of his kindred already. The

governor of Chendi is called in discourse Mek el Jaheleen, prince of

the Arabs of Beni Koreish, who are all settled, as I have already

said, about the bottom of Atbara, on both sides of the Magiran.

There is a tradition at Chendi, that a woman, whose name was Hendaqué,

once governed all that country, whence we might imagine that this

was part of the kingdom of Candace; for writing this name in Greek

letters it will come to be no other than Hendaqué, the native, or

mistress, of Chendi, or Chandi. However this may be, Chendi was once

a town of great resort. The caravans of Sennaar, Egypt, Suakem, and

Kordofan, all were in use to rendezvous here, especially since the

Arabs have cut off the road by Dongola, and the desert of Bahiouda;

and though it be not now a place of great plenty, yet every thing here

is at a cheaper rate, and better than at Sennaar; we must except the

article fuel, for wood is much dearer here than in any part of Atbara;

the people all burn camels dung. Indeed, were it not for dressing

victuals, fire in a place so hot as this would be a nuisance. It was

so sultry in the end of August and beginning of September, that many

people dropt down dead with heat, both in the town and villages round

it; but it is now said to be much cooler, though the thermometer at

noon was once so high as 119°.

Chendi has in it about 250 houses, which are not all built contiguous,

some of the best of them being separate, and that of Sittina's is half

a mile from the town. There are two or three tolerable houses, but the

rest of them are miserable hovels, built of clay and reeds. Sittina

gave us one of these houses, which I used for keeping my instruments

and baggage from being pilfered or broken; I slept abroad in the tent,

and it was even there hot enough. The women of Chendi are esteemed

the most beautiful in Atbara, and the men the greatest cowards. This

is the character they bear among their countrymen, but we had little

opportunity of verifying either.

On our arrival at Chendi we found the people very much alarmed at

a phænomenon, which, though it often happens, by some strange

inadvertency had never been observed, even in this serene sky. The

planet Venus appeared shining with undiminished light all day, in

defiance of the brightest sun, from which she was but little distant.

Tho' this phænomenon be visible every four years, it filled all the

people, both in town and country, with alarm. They flocked to me in

crowds from all quarters to be satisfied what it meant, and, when they

saw my telescopes and quadrant, they could not be persuaded but that

the star had become visible by some correspondence and intelligence

with me, and for my use. The bulk of the people in all countries is

the same; they never foretell any thing but evil. The very regular

and natural appearance of this planet was immediately converted,

therefore, into a sign that there would be a bad harvest next year,

and scanty rains; that Abou Kalec with an army would depose the king,

and over-run all Atbara; whilst some threatened me as a principal

operator in bringing about these disasters. On the other hand, without

seeming over-solicitous about my vindication, I insinuated among the

better sort, that this was a lucky and favourable sign, a harbinger of

good fortune, plenty, and peace. The clamour upon this subsided very

much to my advantage, the rather, because Sittina and her son Idris

knew certainly that Mahomet Abou Kalec was not to be in Atbara that

year.

On the 12th of October I waited upon Sittina, who received me behind a

screen, so that it was impossible either to see her figure or face; I

observed, however, that there were apertures so managed in the screen

that she had a perfect view of me. She expressed herself with great

politeness, talked much upon the terms in which Adelan was with the

king, and wondered exceedingly how a white man like me should venture

so far in such an ill-governed country. "Allow me, Madam, said I, to

complain of a breach of hospitality in you, which no Arab has been yet

guilty of towards me."--"Me! said she, that would be strange indeed,

to a man that bears my brother's letter. How can that be!"--"Why, you

tell me, Madam, that I am a white man, by which I know that you see

me, without giving me the like advantage. The queens of Sennaar did

not use me so hardly; I had a full sight of them without having used

any importunity." On this she broke out into a great fit of laughter;

then fell into a conversation about medicines to make her hair grow,

or rather to hinder it from falling off. She desired me to come to

her the next day; that her son Idris would be then at home from the

Howat[47], and that he very much wished to see me. She that day sent

us plenty of provisions from her own table.

On the 13th it was so excessively hot that it was impossible to suffer

the burning sun. The poisonous simoom blew likewise as if it came from

an oven. Our eyes were dim, our lips cracked, our knees tottering,

our throats perfectly dry, and no relief was found from drinking an

immoderate quantity of water. The people advised me to dip a spunge

in vinegar and water, and hold it before my mouth and nose, and this

greatly relieved me. In the evening I went to Sittina. Upon entering

the house, a black slave laid hold of me by the hand, and placed me

in a passage, at the end of which were two opposite doors. I did not

well know the reason of this; but had staid only a few minutes when

I heard one of the doors at the end of the passage open, and Sittina

appeared magnificently dressed, with a kind of round cap of solid gold

upon the crown of her head, all beat very thin, and hung round with

sequins; with a variety of gold chains, solitaires, and necklaces of

the same metal, about her neck. Her hair was plaited in ten or twelve

small divisions like tails, which hung down below her waist, and over

her was thrown a common cotton white garment. She had a purple silk

stole, or scarf, hung very gracefully upon her back, brought again

round her waist, without covering her shoulders or arms. Upon her

wrists she had two bracelets like handcuffs, about half an inch thick,

and two gold manacles of the same at her feet, fully an inch diameter,

the most disagreeable and aukward part of all her dress. I expected

she would have hurried through with some affectation of surprise. On

the contrary, she stopt in the middle of the passage, saying, in a

very grave manner, "Kifhalec,"--how are you? I thought this was an

opportunity of kissing her hand, which I did, without her shewing any

sort of reluctance. "Allow me as a physician, said I, Madam, to say

one word." She bowed with her head, and said, "Go in at that door, and

I will hear you." The slave appeared, and carried me through a door at

the bottom of the passage into a room, while her mistress vanished in

at another door at the top, and there was the screen I had seen the

day before, and the lady sitting behind it.

She was a woman scarcely forty, taller than the middle size, had a

very round, plump face, her mouth rather large, very red lips, the

finest teeth and eyes I have seen, but at the top of her nose,

and between her eye-brows, she had a small speck made of cohol or

antimony, four-corner'd, and of the size of the smallest patches our

women used to wear; another rather longer upon the top of her nose,

and one on the middle of her chin.

_Sittina._ "Tell me what you would say to me as a physician."--_Ya._

"It was, Madam, but in consequence of your discourse yesterday. That

heavy gold cap with which you press your hair will certainly be the

cause of a great part of it falling off." _Sitt._ "I believe so; but

I should catch cold, I am so accustomed to it, if I was to leave it

off. Are you a man of name and family in your own country?" _Ya._

"Of both, Madam." _Sitt._ "Are the women handsome there?" _Ya._ "The

handsomest in the world, Madam; but they are so good, and so excellent

in all other respects, that nobody thinks at all of their beauty, nor

do they value themselves upon it." _Sitt._ "And do they allow you to

kiss their hands?" _Ya._ "I understand you, Madam, though you have

mistaken me. There is no familiarity in kissing hands, it is a mark of

homage, and distant respect paid in my country to our sovereigns, and

to none earthly besides." _Sitt._ "O yes! but the kings." _Ya._ "Yes,

and the queens, too, always on the knee, Madam; I said our sovereigns,

meaning both king and queen. On her part it is a mark of gracious

condescension, in favour of rank, merit, and honourable behaviour;

it is a reward for dangerous and difficult services, above all other

compensation." _Sitt._ "But do you know that no man ever kissed my

hand but you?" _Ya._ "It is impossible I should know that, nor is it

material. Of this I am confident it was meant respectfully, cannot

hurt you, and ought not to offend you." _Sitt._ "It certainly has

done neither, but I wish very much Idris my son would come and see

you, as it is on his account I dressed myself to-day." _Ya._ "I hope,

Madam, when I do see him he will think of some way of forwarding me

safely to Barbar, in my way to Egypt." _Sitt._ "Safely! God forgive

you! you are throwing yourself away wantonly. Idris himself, king of

this country, dares not undertake such a journey. But why did not

you go along with Mahomet Towash? He set out only a few days ago for

Cairo, the same way you are going, and has, I believe, taken all the

Hybeers with him. Go call the porter", says she to her slave. When

the porter came, "Do you know if Mahomet Towash is gone to Egypt?" "I

know he is gone to Barbar, says the porter, the two Mahomets, and Abd

el Jelleel, the Bishareen, are with him." "Why did he take all the

Hybeers?" says Sittina. "The men were tired and discouraged, answered

the porter, by their late ill-usage from the Cubba-beesh, and, being

stripped of every thing, they wanted to be at home." _Sitt._ "Somebody

else will offer, but you must not go without a good man with you; I

will not suffer you. These Bishareen are people known here, and may be

trusted; but while you stay let me see you every day, and if you want

any thing, send by a servant of mine. It is a tax, I know, improperly

laid upon a man like you, to ask for every necessary, but Idris will

be here, and he will provide you better." I went away upon this

conversation, and soon found, that Mahomet Towash had so well followed

the direction of the Mek of Sennaar, as to take all the Hybeers of

note with him on purpose to disappoint me.

This being the first time I have had occasion to mention this useful

set of men, it will be necessary I should here explain their office

and occupation. A Hybeer is a guide, from the Arabic word Hubbar, to

inform, instruct, or direct, because they are used to do this office

to the caravans travelling through the desert in all its directions,

whether to Egypt and back again, the coast of the Red Sea, or the

countries of Sudan, and the western extremities of Africa. They are

men of great consideration, knowing perfectly the situation and

properties of all kinds of water to be met on the route, the distance

of wells, whether occupied by enemies or not, and, if so, the way

to avoid them with the least inconvenience. It is also necessary to

them to know the places occupied by the simoom, and the seasons of

their blowing in those parts of the desert, likewise those occupied

by moving sands. He generally belongs to some powerful tribe of Arabs

inhabiting these deserts, whose protection he makes use of to assist

his caravans, or protect them in time of danger, and handsome rewards

were always in his power to distribute on such occasions; but now

that the Arabs in these deserts are everywhere without government,

the trade between Abyssinia and Cairo given over, that between Sudan

and that metropolis much diminished, the importance of that office of

Hybeer, and its consideration, is fallen in proportion, and with these

the safe conduct; and we shall see presently a caravan cut off by the

treachery of the very Hybeers that conducted them, the first instance

of the kind that ever happened.

One day, sitting in my tent musing upon the very unpromising aspect of

my affairs, an Arab of very ordinary appearance, naked, with only a

cotton cloth around his middle, came up to me, and offered to conduct

me to Barbar and thence to Egypt. He said his house was at Daroo on

the side of the Nile, about twenty miles beyond Syene, or Assouan,

nearer Cairo. I asked him why he had not gone with Mahomet Towash? He

said, he did not like the company, and was very much mistaken if their

journey ended well. Upon pressing him further if this was really the

only reason, he then told me, that he had been sick for some months

at Chendi, contracted debt, and had been obliged to pawn his cloaths,

and that his camel was detained for what still remained unpaid. After

much conversation, repeated several days, I found that Idris (for

that was his name) was a man of some substance in his own country,

and had a daughter married to the Schourbatchie at Assouan. He said

that this was his last journey, for he never would cross the desert

again. A bargain was now soon made. I redeemed his camel and cloak; he

was to shew me the way to Egypt, and he was there to be recompensed,

according to his behaviour.

Chendi, by repeated observations of the sun and stars, made for

several succeeding days and nights, I found to be in lat. 16° 38´

35´´ north, and at the same place, the 13th of October, I observed an

immersion of the first satellite of Jupiter, from which I concluded

its longitude to be 33° 24´ 45´´ east of the meridian of Greenwich.

The highest degree of the thermometer of Fahrenheit in the shade was,

on the 10th of October, at one o'clock P. M. 119°, wind north; the

lowest was on the 11th, at midnight, 87°, wind west, after a small

shower of rain.

I prepared now to leave Chendi, but first returned my benefactress

Sittina thanks for all her favours. She had called for Idris, and

given him very positive instructions, mixt with threats, if he

misbehaved; and hearing what I had done for him, she too gave him an

ounce of gold, and said, at parting, that, for knowledge of the road

through the desert, she believed Idris to be as perfect as any body;

but in case we met with the Bishareen, they would neither shew to him

nor to me any mercy. She gave me, however, a letter to Mahomet Abou

Bertran, Shekh of one of the tribes of Bishareen, on the Tacazzé, near

the Magiran, which she had made her son write from the Howat, it not

being usual, she said, for her to write herself. I begged I might be

again allowed to testify my gratitude by kissing her hand, which she

condescended to in the most gracious manner, laughing all the time,

and saying, "Well, you are an odd man! if Idris my son saw me just

now, he would think me mad."

On the 20th of October, in the evening, we left Chendi, and rested two

miles from the town, and about a mile from the river; and next day,

the 21st, at three quarters past four in the morning we continued our

journey, and passed through five or six villages of the Jaheleen on

our left; at nine we alighted to feed our camels under some trees,

having gone about ten miles. At this place begins a large island in

the Nile several miles long, full of villages, trees, and corn, it is

called Kurgos. Opposite to this is the mountain Gibbainy, where is the

first scene of ruins I have met with since that of Axum in Abyssinia.

We saw here heaps of broken pedestals, like those of Axum, all plainly

designed for the statues of the dog; some pieces of obelisk, likewise,

with hieroglyphics, almost totally obliterated. The Arabs told us

these ruins were very extensive; and that many pieces of statues,

both of men and animals, had been dug up there; the statues of the men

were mostly of black stone. It is impossible to avoid risquing a guess

that this is the ancient city of Meroë, whose latitude should be 16°

26´; and I apprehend further, that in this island was the observatory

of that famous cradle of astronomy. The Ethiopians cannot pronounce

P; there is, indeed, no such letter in their alphabet. Curgos, then,

the name of the island, should probably be Purgos, the tower or

observatory of that city.

There are four remarkable rivers mentioned by the ancients as

contributing to form the island of Meroë. The first is the Astusaspes,

or the river Mareb, so called from hiding itself under ground in the

sand, and again immerging in the time of rain, and running to join the

Tacazzé.

The next is the Tacazzé, as I have said, the Siris of the ancients, by

the natives called Astaboras, which forms, as Pliny has said, the left

channel of Atbara, or, as the Greeks have called it, the island of

Meroë.

On the west, or right hand, is another considerable river, called

by the name of the White River, and by the ancients Astapus, and

which Diodorus Siculus says comes from large lakes to the southward,

which we know to be truth. This river throws itself into the Nile,

and together with it makes the right-hand channel, inclosing Meroë

or Atbara. The Nile here is called the Blue River; and Nil, in the

language of the country, has precisely that signification. This too

was known to the ancients, as the Greeks have called it the Blue

River, and these being all found to inclose Meroë, neither Gojam, nor

any place that is not so limited, can ever be taken for that island.

I will not pretend to say that any positive proof should be founded

upon the astronomical observations of the ancients, unless there

are circumstances that go hand in hand with, and corroborate them;

but we should be at a very great loss indeed, notwithstanding all

the diligence of modern travellers, were we to throw the celestial

observations of the ancients entirely behind us. We have, from various

concurring circumstances, fixed our Meroë at Gerri, or between that

town and Wed Baal a Nagga, that is about lat. 16° 10´ north; and

Ptolemy, from an observation of the Solstice, fixes it at 16° 26´, so

that the error here, if any, seems to be of no consequence, as the

direction of the city might extend to the northward. The observations

mentioned by Pliny are not so accurate, nor do they merit to be put

in competition with those of Ptolemy, for very obvious reasons;

yet still, when strictly examined, they do not fail, inaccurate as

they are, to throw some light upon this subject. He says the sun is

vertical at Meroë twice a-year, once when he enters the 18° of Taurus,

and again when he is in the 14th degree of the Lion.

Here are three impossibilities, which plainly shew that this error is

not that of Pliny, but of an ignorant transcriber; for if the zenith

of Meroë answered to the 18th degree of Taurus, it is impossible that

the same point should answer to the 14th degree of the Lion; and if

Syene was 5000 stadia from the one, it is impossible it could be no

more from the other which was south of it, if they were all three

under the same meridian; let us then confess, as we must, that both

these observations are erroneous.

But let us suppose that the first will make the latitude of Meroë to

be 17° 20´, and the second 16° 40´; taking then a medium of these

two bad observations, as is the practice in all such cases, we shall

find the latitude of Meroë to be 16° 30´, only 4´ difference from the

observation of Ptolemy.

Vosius[48], among a multitude of errors he has committed relating to

the Nile, denies that there are any islands in that river. The reader

will be long ago satisfied from our history, that this is without

foundation, seeing that from the island of Rhoda, where stands the

Mikeas, to the island of Curgos, which we have just now mentioned,

we have described several. He would indeed insinuate, that Meroë, or

Atbara, is not an island, but a peninsula, though it is well known in

history these words are constantly used as synonimous; but were it

not so, Meroë scarcely stands in need of this excuse. If the reader

will cast his eye upon the map, he will see two rivers, the Rahad and

Tocoor, that almost meet in lat. 12° 40´ north. Across the peninsula,

left by these rivers, is a small stripe called Falaty, running in a

contrary direction from the general course of rivers in this country,

that is from east to west, though part of it in dry weather is hid in

the sand, and this river makes Atbara a complete island in time of

rain.

Simonides the Less staid five years in Meroë; after him, Aristocreon,

Bion, and Basilis[49]. It is not then probable that men of their

character omitted to ascertain the fact whether or not the place where

they lived was an island. Diodorus Siculus has said, that Meroë was

in the form of a shield, that is, in the figure of that triangular

shield called Scutum, pointed at the bottom, and growing broader

towards the top where it is square. Nothing can be more exact than

this resemblance of the lower part of Atbara, that is, from Gerri to

the Magiran, the part we suppose Diodorus was acquainted with, and it

is scarcely possible that he could have fixed upon this resemblance

without having seen some figure of it delineated upon paper.

As this must suppose a more than ordinary knowledge in Diodorus,

we shall examine how the measures he has given us of the island

correspond with the truth. He says, that the island is 3000 stadia

long, and 1000 stadia broad. Now taking 8 stadia for a mile, we have

375 miles, and measuring with the compass from the river Falaty,

where, as I have said, Atbara becomes an island by the confluence of

the rivers, I find that distance to be 345 miles, of 60 miles to a

degree, so that without making any allowance for the disadvantages

of the country, it is impossible at this day to have a more accurate

estimation. As for the breadth, it is scarcely possible to guess at

what part Diodorus means it was measured, on account of the figure

of the shield, as I have already observed, as constantly varying.

But suppose, as is most probable, that the breadth of the island was

referred to the place where the city stood, then, in place of 125

miles, the produce of 1000 stadia, I find it measures 145 miles, a

difference as little to be regarded as the other.

Let us now examine what information we can learn from the report

of the centurions sent on purpose by Nero to explore this unknown

country, whose report has been looked upon as decisive of the

distances of places through which they passed.

These travellers pretend, that between Syene and the entrance into

the island of Meroë was 873 miles, and from thence to the city 70

miles; the whole distance then between Syene and the city of Meroë

will be 943 miles, or 15° 43´. Now Syene was very certainly in 24°,

a few minutes more or less; and from this if we take 15°, there will

remain 9° of latitude for the island of Meroë, according to the

report of these centurions, and this would have carried Meroë far

to the southward of the fountains of the Nile, and confounded every

idea of the geography of Africa. The parallel which marks 11° cuts

Gojam very exactly in the middle, and this peninsula may be said to

resemble the shield called Pelta; but very certainly not the Scutum,

to which Diodorus has very properly likened it. Besides, their own

observation condemns them, for it is about Meroë where they first

saw an appearance of verdure; the reason of which is very plain, if

the latitude of that city was in 16°, upon the verge of the tropical

rains, where, as an eye-witness, I who have passed that dreary

distance on foot can testify, those green herbs and shrubs, though

they begin, as is very properly and cautiously expressed, to appear

there, seem neither luxuriant nor abundant.

But had the centurions gone to Gojam, they would have passed a hundred

miles of a more verdant and more beautiful country before arriving

there. The psittaci aves, or the paroquets, which they very properly

observed were first seen in Meroë, that is, in Atbara, would have been

sought for in vain in Gojam, a cold country; whereas the paroquet's

delight is in the low, or hot country, where there is always variety

of fruit; neither could Ptolemy's observation, nor those two just

mentioned by Pliny, be admitted, after any sort of modification

whatever.

Strabo remarks of the situation of Meroë, that it was placed upon the

verge of the tropical rains; and, with his usual accuracy and good

sense, he wonders the regularity of these tropical rains, as to their

coming and duration, was not known earlier, when so many occasions

had offered to observe them at Meroë before his time. The same author

says, that the sun is vertical at Meroë forty-five days before the

summer solstice; so that this too will place that island in lat. 16°

44´, very little different from the latitude that Ptolemy gives it.

From all which circumstances we may venture to maintain, that very

few places in ancient geography have their situations more strictly

defined, or by a greater variety of circumstances, than the island of

Atbara or Meroë. But supposing the case were otherwise, there is not

one of these circumstances that I know of, that could be adduced with

any effect to prove Gojam to be Meroë, as Le Grande and the Jesuits

have vainly asserted.

At half past eleven o'clock in the forenoon of the 21st of October,

having spent the whole day in winding through vallies, and the bare

hills of the Acaba, we alighted in a wood about a mile from the

river. This side of the Nile, along which we travelled to-day, is

quite bare, the other full of trees and corn, where are several large

villages.

On the 22d, in the afternoon, we left this place, which is called

Hor-Gibbaity, and passed through several villages of the Macabrab,

named Dow-Dowa, and three miles further came to Demar, a town

belonging to Fakir Wed Madge Doub, who is a saint of the first

consequence among the Jaheleen. They believe that he works miracles,

and can strike whom he pleases with lameness, blindness, or madness;

for which reason they stand very much in awe of him, so that he

passes the caravans in safety through this nest of robbers, such as

the Macabrab are, and always have been, though there are caravans who

chuse rather to pass unseen under the cloud of night, than trust to

the veneration these Jaheleen may have of Wed Madge Doub's sanctity.

After these are Eliab, their habitation four miles on our left at

Howiah.

On the 25th, at three quarters past six in the morning we left Demar,

and at nine came to the Tacazzè, five short miles distant from Demar,

and two small villages built with canes and plaistered with clay,

called Dubba-beah; these are allies of the Macabrab, as coming from

Demar. They took it in their heads to believe that we were a caravan

going to Mecca, in which they were confirmed by a son of Wed Madge

Doub, whom I brought with me, and it was neither my business nor

inclination to undeceive them, but just the contrary.

The Tacazzé is here about a quarter of a mile broad, exceedingly deep,

and they have chosen the deepest part for the ferry. It is clear as

in Abyssinia, where we had often seen it. It rises in the province of

Angot, in about lat. 9°, but has lost all the beauty of its banks,

and runs here thro' a desert and barren country. I reflected with

much satisfaction upon the many circumstances the sight of this river

recalled to my mind; but still the greatest was, that the scenes

of these were now far distant, and that I was by so much the more

advanced towards home. The water of the Tacazzé is judged by the

Arabs to be lighter, clearer, and wholesomer than that of the Nile.

About half a mile after this ferry it joins with that river. Though

the boats were smaller, the people more brutish, and less expert than

those at Halifoon, yet the supposed sanctity of our characters, and

liberal payment, carried us over without any difficulty. These sons

of Mahomet are very robust and strong, and, in all their operations,

seemed to trust to that rather than to address or flight. We left the

passage at a quarter after three, and at half past four arrived at a

gravelly, waste piece of ground, and all round it planted thick with

large trees without fruit. The river is the boundary between Atbara

and Barbar, in which province we now are. Its inhabitants are the

Jaheleen of the tribe of Mirifab.

On the 26th, at six o'clock, leaving the Nile on our left about a

mile, we continued our journey over gravel and sand, through a wood of

acacia-trees, the colour of whose flowers was now changed to white,

whereas all the rest we had before seen were yellow. At one o'clock

we left the wood, and at 40 minutes past three we came to Gooz, a

small village, which nevertheless is the capital of Barbar. The

village of Gooz is a collection of miserable hovels composed of clay

and canes. There are not in it above 30 houses, but there are six or

seven different villages. The heat seemed here a little abated, but

everybody complained of a disease in their eyes they call Tishash,

which often terminates in blindness. I apprehend it to be owing to the

simoom and fine sand blowing through the desert. Here a misfortune

happened to Idris our Hybeer, who was arrested for debt, and carried

to prison. As we were now upon the very edge of the desert, and

to see no other inhabited place till we should reach Egypt, I was

not displeased to have it in my power to lay him under one other

obligation before we trusted our lives in his hands, which we were

immediately to do. I therefore paid his debt, and reconciled him with

his creditors, who, on their part, behaved very moderately to him.

When trade flourished here, and the caravans went regularly, Gooz was

of some consideration, as being the first place where they stopped,

and therefore got the first offer of the market; but now no commerce

remains, nor is it worth while for stated guides to wait there to

conduct the caravans through the desert, as they did formerly. Gooz is

situated fifteen miles from the junction of the two rivers, the Nile

and Tacazzé. By many observations of the sun and stars, and by a mean

of these, I found it to be in lat. 17° 57´ 22´´; and by an immersion

of the first satellite of Jupiter observed there the 5th of November,

determined its longitude to be 34° 20´ 30´´ east of the meridian of

Greenwich. The greatest height of Fahrenheit's thermometer was, at

Gooz, the 28th day of October, at noon, 111°.

Having received all the assurances possible from Idris that he would

live and die with us, after having repeated the prayer of peace, we

put on the best countenance possible, and committed ourselves to

the desert. There were Ismael the Turk, two Greek servants besides

Georgis, who was almost blind and useless. Two Barbarins, who took

care of the camels, Idris, and a young man, a relation of his, who

joined him at Barbar, to return home; in all nine persons, eight only

of whom were effective. We were all well-armed with blunderbusses,

swords, pistols, and double-barrelled guns, except Idris and his

lad, who had lances, the only arms they could use. Five or six naked

wretches of the Tucorory joined us at the watering place, much

against my will, for I knew that we should probably be reduced to the

disagreeable necessity of seeing them die with thirst before our eyes;

or by assisting them, should any accident happen to our water, we ran

a very great risk of perishing with them.

It was on the 9th of November, at noon, we left Gooz, and set out for

the sakia, or watering-place, which is below a little village called

Hassa. All the west side of the Nile is full of villages down to

Takaki, but they are all Jaheleen, without government, and perpetually

in rebellion. At half past three in the afternoon we came to the

Nile to lay in our store of water. We filled four skins, which might

contain altogether about a hogshead and a half. As for our food, it

consisted in twenty-two large goats skins stuffed with a powder of

bread made of dora here at Gooz, on purpose for such expeditions. It

is about the size and shape of a pancake, but thinner. Being much

dried, rather than toasted at the fire, it is afterwards rubbed

between the hands into a dust or powder, for the sake of package; and

the goat's skin crammed as full as possible, and tied at the mouth

with a leather thong. This bread has a sourish taste, which it imparts

to the water when mingled with it, and swells to six times the space

that it occupied when dry. A handful, as much as you could grasp, put

into a bowl made of a gourd sawed in two, about twice the contents

of a common tea-bason, was the quantity allowed to each man every

day, morning and evening; and another such gourd of water divided,

one half two hours before noon, the other about an hour after. Such

were the regulations we all of us subscribed to; we had not camels

for a greater provision. The Nile at Hassa runs at the foot of a

mountain called Jibbel Ateshan, or the _Mountain of Thirst_; the men,

emphatically enough, considering that those who part from it, entering

the desert, take there the first provisions against thirst, and there

those that come to it from the desert first assuage theirs.

On the 11th, about eleven o'clock in the forenoon we left Hassa. It

required a whole day to fill our skins, and soak them well in the

water, in order to make an experiment, which was of the greatest

consequence of any one we ever made, whether these skins were

water-tight or not. I had taken the greatest care while at Chendi to

dawb them well over with grease and tar, to secure their pores on the

outside; but Idris told us this was not enough, and that soaking the

inside with water, filling them choak-full, and tying their mouths

as hard as possible, was the only way to be certain if they were

water-tight without.

While the camels were loading, I bathed myself with infinite pleasure

for a long half hour in the Nile, and thus took leave of my old

acquaintance, very doubtful if we should ever meet again. We then

turned our face to N. E. leaving the Nile, and entering into a bare

desert of fixed gravel, without trees, and of a very disagreeable

whitish colour, mixed with small pieces of white marble, and pebbles

like alabaster. At a quarter past four we alighted in a spot of high

bent grass, where we let our camels feed till eight o'clock, and at

three quarters past ten we halted for the night in another patch of

grass; the place is called Howeela. Jibbel Ateshan bore S. W. and by

W. of us, the distance about seven miles. I inquired of Idris, if he

knew, to point out to me, precisely where Syene lay, and he shewed me

without difficulty. I set it by the compass, and found it to be N.

and by W. very near the exact bearing it turned out upon observation

afterwards. He said, however, we should not keep this tract, but

should be obliged to vary occasionally in search of water, as we

should find the wells in the desert empty or full.

On the 12th, at seven o'clock in the morning we quitted Howeela,

continuing our journey through the desert in the same direction, that

is to the N. E.; our reason was, to avoid as much as possible the

meeting any Arab that could give intelligence of our being on our

journey, for nothing was so easy for people, such as the Bishareen, to

way-lay and cut us off at the well, where they would be sure we must

of necessity pass. At twenty minutes past eight we came to Waadi el

Haimer, where there are a few trees and some bent grass, for this is

the meaning of the word Waadi in a desert. The Arabs, called Sumgar,

are here on the west of us, by the river side. At half past twelve

we alighted on a spot of grass. Takaki from this distance will be

twenty-four miles, between the points N. W. and N. N. W. and from

Takaki to Dongola ten short days journeys, I suppose 180 miles at

most. We are now in the territory of the Bishareen, but they were all

retired to the mountains, a high even ridge, that is something above

two days distance from us, and runs parallel to our course, on the

right hand of us, all the way into Egypt.

At half past eight we alighted in a sandy plain without trees or

grass. Our camels, we found, were too heavily loaded, but we comforted

ourselves that this fault would be mended every day by the use we

made of our provisions; however, it was very much against them that

they were obliged to pass this whole night without eating. This place

is called Umboia. We left Umboia, still stretching farther into the

desert at N. E. At nine we saw a hill called Assero-baybe, with two

pointed tops N. of us, which may be about twelve or fourteen miles

distant, perhaps more. This is the next Hybeer's mark, by which he

directs his course. On the east is Ebenaat, another sharp-pointed

rock, about ten miles distant. All this day, and the evening before,

our road has been through stony, gravelly ground, without herb or

tree. Large pieces of agate and jasper, mixt with many beautiful

pieces of marble, appear everywhere on the ground.

At two o'clock in the afternoon we came to Waadi Amour, where we

alighted, after we had gone six hours this day with great diligence.

Waadi Amour has a few trees and shrubs, but scarce enough to afford

any shade, or night's provision for our camels. Being now without

fear of the Arabs who live upon the Nile, from which we were at

a sufficient distance, we with the same view to safety, declined

approaching the mountains, but held our course nearly N. to a small

spot of grass and white sand, called Assa-Nagga. Here our misfortunes

began, from a circumstance we had not attended to. Our shoes, that had

needed constant repair, were become at last absolutely useless, and

the hard ground, from the time we passed Amour, had worn the skin off

in several places, so that our feet were very much inflamed by the

burning sand.

About a mile north-west of us is Hambily, a rock not considerable in

size, but, from the plain country in which it is situated, has the

appearance of a great tower or castle, and south of it two hillocks

or little hills. These are all land-marks of the utmost consequence

to caravans in their journey, because they are too considerable in

size to be covered at any time by the moving sands. At Assa Nagga,

Assiro-baybe is square with us, and with the turn which the Nile takes

eastward to Korti and Dongola. The Takaki are the people nearest us,

west of Assa Nagga, and Assero-baybe upon the Nile. After these,

when the Nile has turned E. and W. are the Chaigie, on both sides of

the river, on to Korti, where the territory called the kingdom of

Dongola begins. As the Nile no longer remains on our left, but makes

a remarkable turn, which has been much misrepresented in the maps, I

put my quadrant in order, and by a medium of three observations, one

of Procyon, one of Rigel, and one of the middle star of the belt of

Orion, I found the latitude of Assa Nagga to be 19° 30´, which being

on a parallel with the farthest point of the Nile northward, gives the

latitude of that place where the river turns west by Korti towards

Dongola, and this was of great service to me in fixing some other

material points in my map.

On the 14th, at seven in the morning we left Assa Nagga, our course

being due north. At one o'clock we alighted among some acacia-trees at

Waadi el Halboub, having gone twenty-one miles. We were here at once

surprised and terrified by a sight surely one of the most magnificent

in the world. In that vast expanse of desert, from W. and to N. W.

of us, we saw a number of prodigious pillars of sand at different

distances, at times moving with great celerity, at others stalking on

with a majestic slowness; at intervals we thought they were coming in

a very few minutes to overwhelm us; and small quantities of sand did

actually more than once reach us. Again they would retreat so as to

be almost out of sight, their tops reaching to the very clouds. There

the tops often separated from the bodies; and these, once disjoined,

dispersed in the air, and did not appear more. Sometimes they were

broken near the middle, as if struck with a large cannon shot. About

noon they began to advance with considerable swiftness upon us, the

wind being very strong at north. Eleven of them ranged alongside of

us about the distance of three miles. The greatest diameter of the

largest appeared to me at that distance as if it would measure ten

feet. They retired from us with a wind at S. E. leaving an impression

upon my mind to which I can give no name, though surely one ingredient

in it was fear, with a considerable deal of wonder and astonishment.

It was in vain to think of flying; the swiftest horse, or fastest

sailing ship, could be of no use to carry us out of this danger, and

the full persuasion of this rivetted me as if to the spot where I

stood, and let the camels gain on me so much in my state of lameness,

that it was with some difficulty I could overtake them.

The effect this stupendous sight had upon Idris was to set him to his

prayers, indeed rather to his charms; for, besides the name of God and

Mahomet, all the rest of the words were mere gibberish and nonsense.

This created a violent altercation between him and Ismael the Turk,

who abused him for not praying in the words of the Koran, maintaining,

with apparent great wisdom at the same time, that nobody had charms to

stop these moving sands but the inhabitants of Arabia Deserta.

The Arabs to whom this inhospitable spot belongs are the Adelaia.

They, too, are Jaheleen, or Arabs of Beni Koreish. They are said to

be a harmless race, and to do no hurt to the caravans they meet;

yet I very much doubt, had we fallen in with them they would not

have deserved the good name that was given them. We went very slowly

to-day, our feet being sore and greatly swelled. The whole of our

company were much disheartened, (except Idris) and imagined that they

were advancing into whirlwinds of moving sand, from which they

should never be able to extricate themselves; but before four o'clock

in the afternoon these phantoms of the plain had all of them fallen to

the ground and disappeared. In the evening we came to Waadi Dimokea,

where we passed the night, much disheartened, and our fear more

increased, when we found, upon wakening in the morning, that one side

was perfectly buried in the sand that the wind had blown above us in

the night.

From this day, subordination, though not entirely ceased, was fast

on the decline; all was discontent, murmuring, and fear. Our water

was greatly diminished, and that terrible death by thirst began to

stare us in the face, and this was owing in a great measure to our

own imprudence. Ismael, who had been left centinel over the skins of

water, had slept so soundly, that this had given an opportunity to

a Tucorory to open one of the skins that had not been touched, and

serve himself out of it at his own discretion. I suppose that, hearing

somebody stir, and fearing detection, he had withdrawn himself as

speedily as possible, without taking time to tie the mouth of the

girba, which we found in the morning with scarce a quart of water in

it.

On the 15th, at a quarter past seven in the morning we left Waadi

Dimokea, keeping a little to the westward of north, as far as I could

judge, just upon the line of Syene. The same ridge of hills being on

our right and left as yesterday, in the center of these appeared Del

Aned. At twenty minutes past two o'clock in the afternoon we came

to an opening in the ridge of rocks; the passage is about a mile

broad, through which we continued till we alighted at the foot of the

mountain Del Aned. The place is called Waadi Del Aned.

The same appearance of moving pillars of sand presented themselves to

us this day in form and disposition like those we had seen at Waadi

Halboub, only they seemed to be more in number, and less in size. They

came several times in a direction close upon us; that is, I believe,

within less than two miles. They began, immediately after sun-rise,

like a thick wood, and almost darkened the sun: His rays shining

through them for near an hour, gave them an appearance of pillars of

fire. Our people now became desperate: The Greeks shrieked out, and

said it was the day of judgment. Ismael pronounced it to be hell, and

the Tucorories, that the world was on fire. I asked Idris if ever

he had before seen such a sight? He said he had often seen them as

terrible, though never worse; but what he feared most was that extreme

redness in the air, which was a sure presage of the coming of the

simoom. I begged and entreated Idris that he would not say one word

of that in the hearing of the people, for they had already felt it at

Imhanzara in their way from Ras el Feel to Teawa, and again at the

Acaba of Gerri, before we came to Chendi, and they were already nearly

distracted at the apprehension of finding it here.

At half past four o'clock in the afternoon we left Waadi Del Aned,

our course a little more to the westward than the direction of Syene.

The sands which had disappeared yesterday scarcely shewed themselves

at all this day, and at a great distance from the horizon. This was,

however, a comfort but of short duration. I observed Idris took no

part in it, but only warned me and the servants, that, upon the coming

of the simoom, we should fall upon our faces, with our mouths upon the

earth, so as not to partake of the outward air as long as we could

hold our breath. We alighted at six o'clock at a small rock in the

sandy ground, without trees or herbage, so that our camels fasted all

that night. This place is called Ras el Seah, or, by the Bishareen, El

Mout, which signifies death, a name of bad omen.

On the 16th, at half past ten in the forenoon we left El Mout,

standing in the direction close upon Syene. Our men, if not gay,

were however in better spirits than I had seen them since we left

Gooz. One of our Barbarins had even attempted a song; but Hagi Ismael

very gravely reproved him, by telling him, that singing in such a

situation was a tempting of Providence. There is, indeed, nothing more

different than active and passive courage. Hagi Ismael would fight,

but he had not strength of mind to suffer. At eleven o'clock, while we

contemplated with great pleasure the rugged top of Chiggre, to which

we were fast approaching, and where we were to solace ourselves with

plenty of good water, Idris cried out, with a loud voice, Fall upon

your faces, for here is the simoom. I saw from the S. E. a haze come,

in colour like the purple part of the rainbow, but not so compressed

or thick. It did not occupy twenty yards in breadth, and was about

twelve feet high from the ground. It was a kind of blush upon the

air, and it moved very rapidly, for I scarce could turn to fall upon

the ground with my head to the northward, when I felt the heat of

its current plainly upon my face. We all lay flat on the ground,

as if dead, till Idris told us it was blown over. The meteor, or

purple haze, which I saw, was indeed passed, but the light air that

still blew was of heat to threaten suffocation. For my part, I found

distinctly in my breast that I had imbibed a part of it, nor was I

free of an asthmatic sensation till I had been some months in Italy,

at the baths of Poretta, near two years afterwards.

An universal despondency had taken possession of our people. They

ceased to speak to one another, and when they did, it was in

whispers, by which I easily guessed their discourse was not favourable

to me, or else that they were increasing each others fears, by vain

suggestions calculated to sink each others spirits still further,

but from which no earthly good could possibly result. I called them

together, and both reprimanded and exhorted them in the strongest

manner I could; I bade them attend to me, who had nearly lost my

voice by the simoom, and desired them to look at my face, so swelled

as scarcely to permit me to see; my neck covered with blisters, my

feet swelled and inflamed, and bleeding with many wounds. In answer

to the lamentation that the water was exhausted, and that we were

upon the point of dying with thirst, I ordered each man a gourd full

of water more than he had the preceding day, and shewed them, at no

great distance, the bare, black, and sharp point of the rock Chiggre,

wherein was the well at which we were again to fill our girbas, and

thereby banish the fear of dying by thirst in the desert. I believe I

never was at any time more eloquent, and never had eloquence a more

sudden effect. They all protested and declared their concern chiefly

arose from the situation they saw me in; that they feared not death

or hardship, provided I would submit a little to their direction in

the taking a proper care of myself. They intreated me to use one of

the camels, and throw off the load that it carried, that it would ease

me of the wounds in my feet, by riding at least part of the day. This

I positively refused to do, but recommended to them to be strong of

heart, and to spare the camels for the last resource, if any should be

taken ill and unable to walk any longer.

This phænomenon of the simoom, unexpected by us, though foreseen by

Idris, caused us all to relapse into our former despondency. It still

continued to blow, so as to exhaust us entirely, though the blast

was so weak as scarcely would have raised a leaf from the ground. At

twenty minutes before five the simoom ceased, and a comfortable and

cooling breeze came by starts from the north, blowing five or six

minutes at a time, and then falling calm. We were now come to the

Acaba, the ascent before we arrived at Chiggre, where we intended to

have stopt that night, but we all moved on with tacit consent, nor did

one person pretend to say how far he guessed we were to go.

At thirteen minutes past eight we alighted in a sandy plain absolutely

without herbage, covered with loose stones, a quarter of a mile due

north of the well, which is in the narrow gorge, forming the southern

outlet of this small plain. Though we had travelled thirteen hours

and a quarther this day, it was but at a slow pace, our camels being

famished, as well as tired, and lamed likewise by the sharp stones

with which the ground in all places was covered. The country, for

three days past, had been destitute of herbage of any kind, entirely

desert, and abandoned to moving sands. We saw this day, after passing

Ras el Seah, large blocks and strata of pure white marble, equal to

any in colour that ever came from Paros.

Chiggre is a small narrow valley, closely covered up and surrounded

with barren rocks. The wells are ten in number, and the narrow gorge

which opens to them is not ten yards broad. The springs, however,

are very abundant. Wherever a pit is dug five or six feet deep, it

is immediately filled with water. The principal pool is about forty

yards square and five feet deep; but the best tasted water was in

the cleft of a rock, about 30 yards higher, on the west side of this

narrow outlet. All the water, however, was very foul, with a number

of animals both aquatic and land. It was impossible to drink without

putting a piece of our cotton girdle over our mouths, to keep, by

filtration, the filth of dead animals out of it. We saw a great many

partridges upon the face of the bare rock; but what they fed upon

I could not guess, unless upon insects. We did not dare to shoot

at them, for fear of being heard by the wandering Arabs that might

be somewhere in the neighbourhood; for Chiggre is a haunt of the

Bishareen of the tribe of Abou Bertran, who, though they do not make

it a station, because there is no pasture in the neighbourhood, nor

can any thing grow there, yet it is one of the most valuable places of

refreshment, on account of the great quantity of water, being nearly

half way, when they drive their cattle from the borders of the Red Sea

to the banks of the Nile; as also in their expeditions from south to

north, when they leave their encampments in Barbar, to rob the Ababdé

Arabs on the frontiers of Egypt.

Our first attention was to our camels, to whom we gave that day a

double feed of dora, that they might drink for the rest of their

journey, should the wells in the way prove scant of water. We then

washed in a large pool, the coldest water, I think, I ever felt, on

account of its being in a cave covered with rock, and was inaccessible

to the sun in any direction. All my people seemed to be greatly

recovered by this refrigeration, but from some cause or other, it

fared otherwise with the Tucorory; one of whom died about an hour

after our arrival, and another early the next morning.

Subordination, if now not entirely gone, was expiring, so that I

scarcely expected to have interest enough with my own servants to

help me to set up my large quadrant: Yet I was exceedingly curious to

know the situation of this remarkable place, which Idris the Hybeer

declared to be halfway to Assouan. But it seems their curiosity was

not less than mine; above all, they wanted to prove that Idris was

mistaken, and that we were considerably nearer to Egypt than we were

to Barbar. While Idris and the men filled the skins with water, the

Greeks and I set up the quadrant, and, by observation of the two

bright stars of Orion, I found the latitude of Chiggre to be 20° 58´

30´´ N.; so that, allowing even some small error in the position of

Syene in the French maps, Idris's guess was very near the truth, and

both the latitude and longitude of Chiggre and Syene seemed to require

no further investigation.

During the whole time of the observation, an antelope of a very large

kind, went several times round and round the quadrant; and at the time

when my eyes were fixed upon the star, came so near as to bite a part

of my cotton cloth which I had spread like a carpet to kneel on. Even

when I stirred, it would leap about two or three yards from me, and

then stand and gaze with such attention, that it would have appeared

to by-standers (had there been any) that we had been a long time

acquainted. The first idea was the common one, to kill it. I easily

could have done this with a lance; but it seemed so interested in what

I was doing, that I began to think it might perhaps be my good genius

which had come to visit, protect, and encourage me in the desperate

situation in which I then was.

CHAP. XII.

_Distresses in the Desert--Meet with Arabs--Camels die--Baggage

abandoned--Come to Syene._

On the 17th of November, at half past ten in the forenoon, we

left the valley and pool of Chiggre. Ismael, and Georgis the blind

Greek, had complained of shivering all night, and I began to be very

apprehensive some violent fever was to follow. Their perspiration had

not returned but in small quantity ever since their coming out of

the water, and the night had been excessively cold, the thermometer

standing at 63°. The day, however, was insufferably hot, and their

complaints insensibly wore off to my great comfort. A little before

eleven we were again terrified by an army (as it seemed) of sand

pillars, whose march was constantly south, and the favourite field

which they occupied was that great circular space which the Nile makes

when opposite to Assa Nagga, where it turns west to Korti and Dongola.

At one time a number of these pillars faced to the eastward, and

seemed to be coming directly upon us; but, though they were little

nearer us than two miles, a considerable quantity of sand fell round

us. I began now to be somewhat reconciled to this phænomenon, seeing

it had hitherto done us no harm. The great magnificence it exhibited

in its appearance, seemed, in some measure, to indemnify us for the

panic it had first occasioned: But it was otherwise with the simoom;

we all of us were firmly persuaded that another passage of the purple

meteor over us would be attended with our deaths.

At half past four we alighted in a vast plain, bounded on all sides by

low sandy hills, which seemed to have been transported hither lately.

These hillocks were from seven to thirteen feet high, drawn into

perfect cones, with very sharp points and well-proportioned bases.

The sand was of an inconceivable fineness, having been the sport of

hot winds for thousands of years. There could be no doubt that the

day before, when it was calm, and we suffered so much by the simoom

between El Mout and Chiggre, the wind had been raising pillars of sand

in this place, called Umdoom; marks of the whirling motion of the

pillars were distinctly seen in every heap, so that here again, while

we were repining at the simoom, Providence was busied keeping us out

of the way of another scene, where, if we had advanced a day, we had

all of us been involved in inevitable destruction.

On the 18th we left Umdoom at seven in the morning, our direction N.

a little inclined to W.; at nine o'clock we passed through a sandy

plain, without trees or verdure. About 300 yards out of our way, to

the left, among some sandy hillocks, where the ground seems to be

more elevated than the rest, Idris the Hybeer told me, that one of

the largest caravans which ever came out of Egypt, under the conduct

of the Ababdé and the Bishareen Arabs, was there covered with sand,

to the number of some thousands of camels. There are large rocks of

grey granite scattered through this plain. At ten o'clock we alighted

at a place called Erboygi, where are some trees, to feed our camels.

The trees I have so often mentioned in our journey thro' the desert

are not timber, or tall-growing trees; there are none of these north

of Sennaar, except a few at Chendi. The trees I speak of, which the

camels eat, are a kind of dwarf acacia, growing only to the height of

bushes; and the wood spoken of likewise is only of the desert kind,

ate almost bare by the camels. There are some high trees, indeed, on

the banks of the Nile. At half past one o'clock we left Erboygi, and

came to a large wood of doom (Palma cuciofera). Here, for the first

time, we saw a shrub which very much resembled Spanish broom. The

whole ground is dead sand, with some rocks of reddish granite. Exactly

at five o'clock we alighted in the wood, after having travelled a

moderate pace. The place is called El Cowie, and is a station of the

Bishareen in the summer months; but these people were now east of us,

three days journey, towards the Red Sea, where the rains had fallen,

and there was plenty of pasture. At forty minutes past twelve we left

El Cowie, and at five o'clock in the evening alighted in a wood,

called Terfowey, full of trees and grass. The trees are the tallest

and largest we had seen since leaving the Nile. We had this day

enjoyed, as it were, a holiday, free from the terrors of the sand, or

dreadful influence of the simoom. This poisonous wind had made several

attempts to prevail this day, but was always overpowered by a cool

breeze at north.

On the 19th we left the west end of the wood, or rather continued the

whole length of it, and at a quarter past eight in the evening arrived

at the well. It is about four fathoms deep, but the spring not very

abundant. We drained it several times, and were obliged to wait its

filling again. These last two days, since we were at El Cowie, we had

seen more verdure than we had altogether since we left Barbar. Here,

particularly at Terfowey, the acacia-trees are tall and verdant, but

the mountains on each side appear black and barren beyond imagination.

As soon as we alighted at Terfowey, and had chosen a proper place

where our camels could feed, we unloaded our baggage near them, and

sent the men to clean the well, and wait the filling of the skins. We

had lighted a large fire. The nights were excessively cold, though the

thermometer was at 53°; and that cold occasioned me inexpressible pain

in my feet, now swelled to a monstrous size, and everywhere inflamed

and excoriated. I had taken upon me the charge of the baggage, and

Mahomet, Idris's young man, the care of the camels; but he too was

gone to the well, though expected to return immediately.

A doubt had arisen in my mind by the way, which was then giving me

great uneasiness. If Syene is under the same meridian with Alexandria,

(for so Eratosthenes conceived when he attempted to measure the

circumference of the earth), in this case, Alexandria being supposed

to lye in long. 30°, Syene must be in 30° likewise; but Gooz being

in 34°, it is impossible that Syene can be within a trifle north of

Gooz; and therefore we must have a much greater quantity of westing to

travel than Idris the Hybeer imagines, who places Syene a very little

west of the meridian of Gooz, or immediately under the same meridian,

and due north from it.

Our camels were always chained by the feet, and the chain secured by

a padlock, lest they should wander in the night, or be liable to be

stolen and carried off. Musing then upon the geographical difficulties

just mentioned, and gazing before me, without any particular intention

or suspicion, I heard the chain of the camels clink, as if somebody

was unloosing them, and then, at the end of the gleam made by the

fire, I saw distinctly a man pass swiftly by, stooping as he went

along, his face almost to the ground. A little time after this I

heard another clink of the chain, as if from a pretty sharp blow,

and immediately after a movement among the camels. I then rose, and

cried in a threatening tone, in Arabic, "I charge you on your life,

whoever you are, either come up to me directly, or keep at a distance

till day, but come that way no more; why should you throw your life

away?" In a minute after, he repassed in the shade among the trees,

pretty much in the manner he had done before. As I was on guard

between the baggage and the camels, I was consequently armed, and

advanced deliberately some steps, as far as the light of the fire

shone, on purpose to discover how many they were, and was ready to

fire upon the next I saw. "If you are an honest man, cried I aloud,

and want any thing, come up to the fire and fear not, I am alone;

but if you approach the camels or the baggage again, the world will

not be able to save your life, and your blood be upon your own head."

Mahomet, Idris's nephew, who heard me cry, came running up from the

well to see what was the matter. We went down together to where the

camels were, and, upon examination, found that the links of one of the

chains had been broke, but the opening not large enough to let the

corresponding whole link through to separate it. A hard blue stone

was driven through a link of one of the chains of another camel, and

left sticking there, the chain not being entirely broken through; we

saw, besides, the print of a man's feet on the sand. There was no need

to tell us after this that we were not to sleep that night; we made

therefore another fire on the other side of the camels with branches

of the acacia-tree, which we gathered. I then sent the man back to

Idris at the well, desiring him to fill his skins with water before

it was light, and transport them to the baggage where I was, and to

be all ready armed there by the dawn of day; soon after which, if the

Arabs were sufficiently strong, we were very certain they would attack

us. This agreed perfectly with Idris's ideas also, so that, contenting

themselves with a lesser quantity of water than they first intended

to have taken, they lifted the skins upon the camels I sent them, and

were at the rendezvous, near the baggage, a little after four in the

morning.

The Barbarins, and, in general, all the lower sort of Moors and Turks,

adorn their arms and wrists with amulets; these are charms, and are

some favourite verse of the Koran wrapt in paper, neatly covered with

Turkey leather. The two Barbarins that were with me had procured for

themselves new ones at Sennaar, which were to defend them from the

simoom and the sand, and all the dangers of the desert. That they

might not soil these in filling the water, they had taken them from

their arms, and laid them on the brink of the well before they went

down. Upon looking for these after the girbas were filled, they were

not to be found. This double attempt was an indication of a number of

people being in the neighbourhood, in which case our present situation

was one of the most desperate that could be figured. We were in the

middle of the most barren, inhospitable desert in the world, and it

was with the utmost difficulty that, from day to day, we could carry

wherewithal to assuage our thirst. We had with us the only bread it

was possible to procure for some hundred miles; lances and swords

were not necessary to destroy us, the bursting or tearing of a girba,

the lameness or death of a camel, a thorn or sprain in the foot which

might disable us from walking, were as certain death to us as a shot

from a cannon. There was no staying for one another; to lose time was

to die, because, with the utmost exertion our camels could make, we

scarce could carry along with us a scanty provision of bread and water

sufficient to keep us alive.

That desert, which did not afford inhabitants for the assistance or

relief of travellers, had greatly more than sufficient for destroying

them. Large tribes of Arabs, two or three thousand, encamped together,

were cantoned, as it were, in different places of this desert, where

there was water enough to serve their numerous herds of cattle, and

these, as their occasion required, traversed in parties all that wide

expanse of solitude, from the mountains near the Red Sea east, to the

banks of the Nile on the west, according as their several designs

or necessities required. These were Jaheleen Arabs, those cruel,

barbarous fanatics, that deliberately shed so much blood during the

time they were establishing the Mahometan religion. Their prejudices

had never been removed by any mixture of strangers, or softened by

society, even with their own nation after they were polished; but

buried, as it were, in these wild deserts, if they were not grown

more savage, they had at least preserved, in their full vigour, those

murdering principles which they had brought with them into that

country, under the brutal and inhuman butcher Kaled Ibn el Waalid,

impiously called _The Sword of God_. If it should be our lot to fall

among these people, and it was next to a certainty that we were at

that very instant surrounded by them, death was certain, and our only

comfort was, that we could die but once, and that to die like men was

in our own option. Indeed, without considering the bloody character

which these wretches naturally bear, there could be no reason for

letting us live: We could be of no service to them as slaves; and to

have sent us into Egypt, after having first rifled and destroyed our

goods, could not be done by them but at a great expence, to which

well-inclined people only could have been induced from charity, and

of that last virtue they had not even heard the name. Our only chance

then remaining was, that their number might be so small, that, by

our great superiority in fire-arms and in courage, we might turn the

misfortune upon the aggressors, deprive them of their camels and means

of carrying water, and leave them scattered in the desert, to that

death which either they or we, without alternative, must suffer.

I explained myself to this purpose, briefly to the people, on which

a great cry followed, "God is great! let them come!" Our arms were

perfectly in order, and our old Turk Ismael seemed to move about and

direct with the vigour of a young man. As we had no doubt they would

be mounted on camels, so we placed ourselves a little within the edge

of the trees. The embers of our two fires were on our front; our

tents, baggage, and boxes, on each side of us, between the opening of

the trees; our camels and water behind us, the camels being chained

together behind the water, and ropes at their heads, which were

tied to trees. A skin of water, and two wooden bowls beside it, was

left open for those that should need to drink. We had finished our

breakfast before day-break, and I had given all the men directions to

fire separately, not together, at the same set of people; and those

who had the blunderbusses to fire where they saw a number of camels

and men together, and especially at any camels they saw with girbas

upon them, or where there was the greatest confusion.

The day broke; no Arabs appeared; all was still. The danger which

occurred to our minds then was, left, if they were few, by tarrying

we should give them time to send off messengers to bring assistance.

I then took Ismael and two Barbarins along with me, to see who these

neighbours of ours could be. We soon traced in the sand the footsteps

of the man who had been at our camels; and, following them behind the

point of a rock, which seemed calculated for concealing thieves, we

saw two ragged, old, dirty tents, pitched with grass cords.

The two Barbarins entered one of them, and found a naked woman there.

Ismael and I ran briskly into the largest, where we saw a man and a

woman both perfectly naked, frightful, emaciated figures, not like the

inhabitants of this world. The man was partly sitting on his hams; a

child, seemingly of the age to suck, was on a rag at the corner, and

the woman looked as if she wished to hide herself. I sprung forward

upon the man, and, taking him by the hair of the head, pulled him upon

his back on the floor, setting my foot upon his breast, and pointing

my knife to his throat; I said to him sternly, "If you mean to pray,

pray quickly, for you have but this moment to live." The fellow was so

frightened, he scarce could beg us to spare his life; but the woman,

as it afterwards appeared, the mother of the sucking child, did not

seem to copy the passive disposition of her husband; she ran to the

corner of the tent, where was an old lance, with which, I doubt not,

she would have sufficiently distinguished herself, but it happened

to be entangled with the cloth of the tent, and Ismael felled her

to the ground with the butt-end of his blunderbuss, and wrested the

lance from her. A violent howl was set up by the remaining woman like

the cries of those in torment. "Tie them, said I, Ismael; keep them

separate, and carry them to the baggage till I settle accounts with

this camel-stealer, and then you shall strike their three heads off,

where they intended to leave us miserably to perish with hunger; but

keep them separate." While the Barbarins were tying the woman, the one

that was the nurse of the child turned to her husband, and said, in

a most mournful, despairing tone of voice, "Did I not tell you, you

would never thrive if you hurt that good man? did not I tell you this

would happen for murdering the Aga?"

Our people had come to see what had passed, and I sent the women

away, ordering them to be kept separate, out of the hearing of one

another, to judge if in their answers they did not prevaricate.

The woman desired to have her child with her, which I granted. The

little creature, instead of being frightened, crowed, and held out

its little hands as it passed me. We fastened the Arab with the chain

of the camels, and so far was well; but still we did not know how

near the Bishareen might be, nor who these were, nor whether they

had sent off any intelligence in the night. Until we were informed

of this, our case was little mended. Upon the man's appearing, all

my people declared, with one general voice, that no time was to be

lost, but that they should all be put to death as soon as the camels

were loaded, before we set out on our journey; and, indeed, at first

view of the thing, self-preservation, the first law of nature, seemed

strongly to require it. Hagi Ismael was so determined on the execution

that he was already seeking a knife sharper than his own. "We will

stay, Hagi Ismael, said I, till we see if this thief is a liar also.

If he prevaricates in the answers he gives to my questions, you shall

then cut his head off, and we will consign him with the lie in his

mouth, soul and body to hell, to his master whom he serves." Ismael

answered, "The truth is the truth; if he lies, he can deserve no

better."

The reader will easily understand the necessity of my speaking at

that moment in terms not only unusual for a Christian, but even in

any society or conversation; and if the ferocity and brutality of

the discourse should shock any, especially my fair readers, they will

remember, that these were intended for a good and humane purpose,

to produce fear in those upon whom we had no other tie, and thereby

extort a confession of the truth; which might answer two purposes,

the saving the effusion of their blood, and providing for our own

preservation. "You see, said I, placing the man upon his knees, your

time is short, the sword is now drawn which is to make an end of you,

take time, answer distinctly and deliberately, for the first trip

or lie that you make, is the last word that you will utter in this

world. Your wife shall have her fair chance likewise, and your child;

you and all shall go together, unless you tell me the naked truth.

Here, Ismael, stand by him, and take my sword, it is, I believe, the

sharpest in the company."

"Now I ask you, at your peril, Who was the good man your wife

reproached you with having murdered? where was it, and when, and who

were your accomplices?" He answered trembling, and indistinctly,

through fear, "It was a black, an Aga from Chendi." "Mahomet Towash,

says Ismael; Ullah Kerim! God is merciful!" "The same," says the

Bishareen. He then related the particulars of his death in the manner

in which I shall have occasion to state afterwards. "Where are the

Bishareen? continued I; where is Abou Bertran? how soon will a light

camel and messenger arrive where he now is?" "In less than two days;

perhaps, says he, in a day and a half, if he is very diligent and the

camel good." "Take care, said I, you are in danger. Where did you

and your women come from, and when?" "From Abou Bertran, says he; we

arrived here at noon on the 5th day[50], but the camels were all

she-camels; they are favourite camels of Shekh Seide; we drove them

softly; the two you saw at the tents are lame; besides there were

some others unsound; there were also women and children." "Where did

that party, and their camels, go to from this? and what number of men

was there with them?" "There were about three hundred camels of all

sorts, and about thirty men, all of them servants; some of them had

one lance, and some of them two; they had no shields or other arms."

"What did you intend last night to do with my camels?" "I intended

to have carried them, with the women and child, to join the party at

the Nile." "What must have become of me in that case? we must have

died?" He did not answer. "Take care, said I, the thing is now over,

and you are in my hands; take care what you say." "Why, certainly,

says he, you must have died, you could not live, you could not go

anywhere else." "If another party had found us here, in that case

would they have slain us?" He hesitated a little, then, as if he

recollected himself, said, "Yes, surely, they murdered the Aga, and

would murder any body that had not a Bishareen with them." A violent

cry of condemnation immediately followed. "Now attend and understand

me distinctly, said I, for upon these two questions hangs your life:

Do you know of any party of Bishareen who are soon to pass here, or

any wells to the north, and in what number? and have you sent any

intelligence since last night you saw us here?" He answered, with

more readiness than usual, "We have sent nobody anywhere; our camels

are lame; we were to follow, as soon as they could be able to travel,

to join those at the Nile. The parties of the Bishareen are always

passing here, sometimes more, sometimes less; they will not come till

they hear from the Nile whether the grass is grown. They have with

them two dromedaries, who will carry the news from the Nile in three

days, or they will come in small parties like the last, for they have

no fear in these parts. The wells to the north belong to the Ababdé.

When they pass by them with cattle they are always in great numbers,

and a Shekh along with them; but those wells are now so scanty they

have not water for any number, and they must therefore all pass this

way."

I got up, and called on Ismael. The poor fellow thought he was to die.

Life is sweet even to the most miserable. He was still upon his knees,

holding his hands clasped round the back of his neck, and already, I

suppose, thought he felt the edge of Ismael's knife. He swore that

every word he had spoken was truth; and if his wife was brought she

could not tell another story.

I thereupon left him, and went to his wife, who, when, she saw Hagi

Ismael with a drawn sword in his hand, thought all was over with her

husband, and fell into a violent fit of despair, crying out, "That

all the men were liars and murderers, but that she would have told

the truth if I had asked her first." "Then go, Hagi Ismael, said I,

tell them not to put him to death till I come, and now you have your

chance, which if you do not improve by telling the truth, I will first

slay your child with my own hand before your face, and then order

you all to be cruelly put to death together." She began with great

earnestness to say, "She could not tell who killed Mahomet Towash, for

she only heard it in conversation from her husband, who was there,

after he had come home." I then, word for word, put those questions

to her that I had done to her husband, and had precisely the same

answers. The only difference was, that she believed a party of the

Ababdé would pass Chiggre soon; but seeing me rise to go away, she

burst out into a flood of tears, and tore her hair in the most violent

excess of passion; shrieking out, to have mercy upon her, and pressing

the little child to her breast as if to take leave of it, then laying

it down before me, in great agony and bitterness of heart, she again

shrieked out, "If you are a Turk, make it a slave, but do not kill my

child, and spare my husband."

Though I understood Arabic well, I did not, till that day, know it

had such powers, or that it contained expressions at once so forcible

and so simple. I found myself so much moved, and my tears came so

fast, that it was in vain to endeavour to carry on a farce under such

tragical appearances, "Woman, said I, I am not a Turk, nor do I make

slaves, or kill children. It is your Arabs that force me to this;

it was you that attacked me last night, it was you that murdered

Mahomet Towash, one of your own religion, and busied in his duty. I

am a stranger, seeking my own safety, but you are all murderers and

thieves."--"It is true, says she, they are all murderers and liars,

and my husband, not knowing, may have lied too. Only let me hear what

he told you, and I will tell you whether it is truth or not." Day

was now advancing apace, and no resolution taken, whilst our present

situation was a very unsafe one. We carried the three prisoners

bound, and set George, the Greek, centinal over them. I then called

the people together.

I stated fairly, in a council held among ourselves, the horror of

slaughtering the women and child, or even leaving them to starve

with hunger by killing their camels, from whom they got their only

sustenance; for, though we should not stain our hands with their

blood, it was the same thing to leave them to perish: that we were

strangers, and had fallen upon them by accident, but they were in

their own country. On the contrary, suppose we only slew the man, any

of the women might mount a camel, and, travelling with diligence,

might inform the Bishareen, who would send a party and cut us off at

the next well, where we must pass, and where it would be impossible to

escape them. I must say, there was a considerable majority for sparing

the women and child, and not one but who willingly decreed the death

of the man, who had confessed he was endeavouring to steal our camels,

and that he intended to carry them to his party at the Nile; in which

case the loss of all our lives was certain, as we should have been

starved to death, or murdered by the Arabs.

The very recital of this attempt so enraged Hagi Ismael that he

desired he might have the preference in cutting off his head. The

Barbarins, too, were angry for the loss of their bracelets. Indeed

every one's opinion was, that the Arab should die, and especially

since the account of their behaviour to Mahomet Towash, whose death I,

for my own part, cannot say I thought myself under any obligation to

revenge. "Since you are differing in your opinions, and there is no

time to lose, said I, allow me to give you mine. It has appeared to

me, that often, since we began this journey, we have been preserved

by visible instances of God's protection, when we should have lost

our lives if we had gone by the rules of our own judgment only. We

are, it is true, of different religions, but all worship the same God.

Suppose the present case should be a trial, whether we trust really in

God's protection, or whether we believe our safety owing to our own

foresight and courage. If the man's life be now taken away, to-morrow

we may meet the Bishareen, and then we shall all reflect upon the

folly of our precaution. For my own part, my constant creed is, that

I am in God's hands, whether in the house or in the desert; and not

in those of the Bishareen, or of any lawless spoiler. I have a clear

conscience, and am engaged in no unlawful pursuit, seeking on foot my

way home, feeding on bread and water, and have done, nor design, wrong

to no man. We are well armed, are nine in number, and have twice as

many firelocks, many of these with double-barrels, and others of a

size never before seen by Arabs, armies of whom have been defeated

with fewer: we are ragged and tattered in our clothes, and no prize

to any one, nor do I think we shall be found a party of pleasure for

any set of wild young men, to leave their own homes, with javelins

and lances to way-lay us at the well for sport and diversion, since

gain and profit are out of the question. But this I declare to you,

if ever we meet these Arabs, if the ground is such as has been near

all the wells we have come to, I will fight the Bishareen boldly and

chearfully, without a doubt of beating them with ease. I do not say

my feelings would be the same if my conscience was loaded with that

most heinous and horrid crime, murder in cold blood; and therefore my

determination is to spare the life even of this man, and will oppose

his being put to death by every means in my power."

It was easy to see, that fear of their own lives only, and not

cruelty, was the reason they sought that of the Arab. They answered

me, two or three of them at once, "That it was all very well; what

should they do? should they give themselves up to the Bishareen, and

be murdered like Mahomet Towash? was there any other way of escaping?"

"I will tell you, then, since you ask me what you should do: You shall

follow the duty of self-defence and self-preservation, as far as you

can do it without a crime. You shall leave the women and the child

where they are, and with them the camels, to give them and their child

milk; you shall chain the husband's right hand to the left of some of

yours, and you shall each of you take him by turns till we shall carry

him into Egypt. Perhaps he knows the desert and the wells better than

Idris; and if he should not, still we have two Hybeers instead of one;

and who can foretell what may happen to Idris more than to any other

of us? But as he knows the stations of his people, and their courses

at particular seasons, that day we meet one Bishareen, the man that is

chained with him, and conducts him, shall instantly stab him to the

heart, so that he shall not see, much less triumph in, the success of

his treachery. On the contrary, if he is faithful, and informs Idris

where the danger is, and where we are to avoid it, keeping us rather

by scanty wells than abundant ones, on the day I arrive safely in

Egypt I will cloath him anew, as also his women, give him a good camel

for himself, and a load of dora for them all. As for the camels we

leave here, they are she-ones, and necessary to give the women food.

They are not lame, it is said, but we shall lame them in earnest, so

that they shall not be able to carry a messenger to the Bishareen

before they die with thirst in the way, both they and their riders, if

they should attempt it."

An universal applause followed this speech; Idris, above all, declared

his warmest approbation. The man and the women were sent for, and had

their sentence repeated to them. They all subscribed to the conditions

chearfully; and the woman declared she would as soon see her child die

as be an instrument of any harm befalling us, and that, if a thousand

Bishareen should pass, she knew how to mislead them all, and that none

of them should follow us till we were far out of danger.

I sent two Barbarins to lame the camels effectually, but not so as to

make them past recovery. After which, for the nurse and the child's

sake, I took twelve handfuls of the bread which was our only food,

and indeed we could scarecly spare it, as we saw afterwards, and left

it to this miserable family, with this agreeable reflection, however,

that we should be to them in the end a much greater blessing than in

the beginning we had been an affliction, provided only they kept their

faith, and on their part deserved it.

On the 20th, at eleven o'clock we left the well at Terfowey, after

having warned the women, that their chance of seeing their husband

again depended wholly upon his and their faithful conduct. We took

our prisoner with us, his right hand being chained to the left of one

of the Barbarins. We had no sooner got into the plain than we felt

great symptoms of the simoom, and about a quarter before twelve, our

prisoner first, and then Idris, cried out, The Simoom! the Simoom!

My curiosity would not suffer me to fall down without looking behind

me. About due south, a little to the east, I saw the coloured haze

as before. It seemed now to be rather less compressed, and to have

with it a shade of blue. The edges of it were not defined as those

of the former, but like a very thin smoke, with about a yard in the

middle tinged with those colours. We all fell upon our faces, and

the simoom passed with a gentle rustling wind. It continued to blow

in this manner till near three o'clock, so we were all taken ill

that night, and scarcely strength was left us to load the camels and

arrange the baggage. This day one of our camels died, partly famished,

partly overcome with extreme fatigue, so that, incapable as we were of

labour, we were obliged, for self-preservation's sake, to cut off thin

slices of the fleshy part of the camel, and hang it in so many thongs

upon the trees all night, and after upon the baggage, the sun drying

it immediately, so as to prevent putrefaction.

At half past eight in the evening we alighted at a well called

Naibey, in a bare, sandy plain, where there were a few straggling

acacia-trees. We had all this day seen large blocks of fossile salt

upon the surface of the earth where we trod. This was the cause, I

suppose, that both the spring at Terfowey, and now this of Naibey,

were brackish to the taste, and especially that of Naibey. We found

near the well the corpse of a man and two camels upon the ground. It

was apparently long ago that this accident happened, for the moisture

of the camel was so exhaled that it seemed to weigh but a very few

pounds; no vermin had touched it, as in this whole desert there is

neither worm, fly, nor any thing that has the breath of life.

On the 21st, at six in the morning, having filled the girbas with

water, we set out from Naibey, our direction due north, and, as we

thought, in a course almost straight upon Syene. The first hour of

our journey was through sharp-pointed rocks, which it was very easy

to foresee would very soon finish our camels. About eight we had a

view of the desert to the westward as before, and saw the sands had

already begun to rise in immense twisted pillars, which darkened the

heavens. The rising of these in the morning so early, we began now to

observe, was a sure sign of a hot day, with a brisk wind at north; and

that heat, and the early rising of the sands, was as sure a sign of

its falling calm about mid-day, and its being followed by two hours of

the poisonous wind. That last consideration was what made the greatest

impression, for we had felt its effects; it had filled us with fear,

and absorbed the last remnant of our strength; whereas the sand,

though a destruction to us if it had involved us in its compass, had

as yet done us no other harm than terrifying us the first days we had

seen it.

It was this day more magnificent than any we had as yet seen. The sun

shining through the pillars, which were thicker, and contained more

sand apparently than any of the preceding days, seemed to give those

nearest us an appearance as if spotted with stars of gold. I do not

think at any time they seemed to be nearer than two miles. The most

remarkable circumstance was, that the sand seemed to keep in that vast

circular space surrounded by the Nile on our left, in going round by

Chaigie towards Dongola, and seldom was observed much to the eastward

of a meridian, passing along the Nile through the Magiran, before it

takes that turn; whereas the simoom was always on the opposite side of

our course, coming upon us from the south-east.

A little before twelve our wind at north ceased, and a considerable

quantity of fine sand rained upon us for an hour afterwards. At the

time it appeared, the description of this phænomenon in Syphax's

speech to Cato was perpetually before my mind:--

So, where our wide Numidian wastes extend,

Sudden th' impetuous hurricanes descend,

Wheel through the air, in circling eddies play,

Tear up the sands, and sweep whole plains away.

The helpless traveller, with wild surprise, }

Sees the dry desert all around him rise, }

And smother'd in the dusty whirlwind dies. }

ADDISON.

These lines are capital, and are a fine copy, which can only appear

tame by the original having been before our eyes, painted by the great

master, the Creator and Ruler of the world.

The simoom, with the wind at S. E. immediately follows the wind at

N. and the usual despondency that always accompanied it. The blue

meteor, with which it began, passed over us about twelve, and the

rustling wind that followed it continued till near two. Silence, and a

desperate kind of indifference about life, were the immediate effects

upon us; and I began now, seeing the condition of my camels, to fear

we were all doomed to a sandy grave, and to contemplate it with some

degree of resignation. At half past eight in the evening we alighted

in a sandy flat, where there was great store of bent grass and trees

which had a considerable degree of verdure, a circumstance much in

favour of our camels. We determined to stop here to give them an

opportunity of eating their fill where they could find it.

On the 22d, at six o'clock we set out from the sandy flat, and one of

the Tucorory was seized with a phrenzy or madness. At first I took

it for a fit of the epilepsy, by the distortions of his face, but it

was soon seen to be of a more serious nature. Whether he had been

before afflicted with it I know not. I offered to bleed him, which he

refused; neither, though we gave him water, would he drink, but very

moderately. He rolled upon the ground, and moaned, often repeating two

or three words which I did not understand. He refused to continue his

journey, or rise from where he lay, so that we were obliged to leave

him to his fortune. We went this day very diligently, not remarkably

slow nor fast; but though our camels, as we thought, had fared well

for these two nights, another of them died about four o'clock this

afternoon, when we came to Umarack.

I here began to provide for the worst. I saw the fate of our camels

approaching, and that our men grew weak in proportion; our bread, too,

began to fail us, altho' we had plenty of camels flesh in its stead;

our water, though in all appearance we were to find it more frequently

than in the beginning of our journey, was nevertheless brackish, and

scarce served the purpose to quench our thirst; and, above all, the

dreadful simoom had perfectly exhausted our strength, and brought

upon us a degree of cowardice and languor that we struggled with in

vain; I therefore, as the last effort, began to throw away every thing

weighty I could spare, or that was not absolutely necessary, such as

all shells, fossiles, minerals, and petrefactions that I could get at,

the counter-cases of my quadrant, telescopes, and clock, and several

suchlike things.

Our camels were now reduced to five, and it did not seem that these

were capable of continuing their journey much longer. In that case,

no remedy remained, but that each man should carry his own water and

provisions. Now, as no one man could carry the water he should use

between well and well, and it was more than probable that distance

would be doubled by some of the wells being found dry; and if that

was not the case, yet, as it was impossible for a man to carry his

provisions who could not walk without any burden at all, our situation

seemed to be most desperate.

The Bishareen alone seemed to keep up his strength, and was in

excellent spirits. He had attached himself, in a particular manner,

to me, and with a part of that very scanty rag which he had round

his waist he had made a wrapper, very artificially, according to the

manner his countrymen the Bishareen practice on such occasions. This

had greatly defended my feet in the day, but the pain occasioned by

the cold in the night was really scarce sufferable. I offered to free

him from the confinement of his left hand, which was chained to some

one of the company night and day; but he very sensibly refused it,

saying, "Unchain my hands when you load and unload your camels, I

cannot then run away from you; for tho' you did not shoot me, I should

starve with hunger and thirst; but keep me to the end of the journey

as you began with me, then I cannot misbehave, and lose the reward

which you say you are to give me."

At forty minutes past three o'clock we saw large stratas of fossile

salt everywhere upon the surface of the ground. At five we found the

body of Mahomet Towash, on the spot where he had been murdered, stript

naked, and lying on his face unburied. The wound in the back-sinew of

his leg was apparent; he was, besides, thrust through the back with a

lance, and had two wounds in the head with swords. We followed some

footsteps in the sand to the right, and there saw three other bodies,

whom Idris knew to be his principal servants. These, it seemed, had

taken to their arms upon the Aga's being first wounded, and the

cowardly, treacherous Bishareens had persuaded them to capitulate upon

promise of giving them camels and provision to carry them into Egypt,

after which they had murdered them behind these rocks.

At six o'clock we alighted at Umarack, so called from a number of

rack-trees that grow there, and which seem to affect a saltish soil;

at Raback and Masuah I had seen them growing in the sea. When I

ordered a halt at Umarack, the general cry was, to travel all night,

so that we might be at a distance from that dangerous, unlucky spot.

The sight of the men murdered, and fear of the like fate, had got

the better of their other sensations. In short, there was nothing

more visible, than that their apprehensions were of two sorts, and

produced very different operations. The simoom, the stalking pillars

of sand, and probability of dying with thirst or hunger, brought on a

torpor, or indifference, that made them inactive; but the discovery

of the Arab at Terfowey, the fear of meeting the Bishareen at the

wells, and the dead bodies of the Aga and his unfortunate companions,

produced a degree of activity and irritation that resembled very much

their spirits being elevated by good news. I told them, that, of all

the places in the desert through which they had passed, this was by

far the safest, because fear of being met by troops from Assouan,

seeking the murderers of Mahomet Towash would keep all the Bishareen

at a distance. Our Arab said, that the next well belonged to the

Ababdé, and not the Bishareen, and that the Bishareen had slain the

Aga there, to make men believe it had been done by the Ababdé. Idris

contributed his morsel of comfort, by assuring us, that the wells now,

as far as Egypt, were so scanty of water, that no party above ten men

would trust their provision to them, and none of us had the least

apprehension from marauders of twice that number. The night at Umarack

was excessively cold as to sensation; Fahrenheit's thermometer was

however at 49° an hour before day-light.

On the 23d we left Umarack at six o'clock in the morning, our road

this day being between mountains of blue stones of a very fine and

perfect quality, through the heart of which ran thick veins of

jasper, their strata perpendicular to the horizon. There were other

mountains of marble of the colour called Isabella. In other places

the rock seemed composed of petrified wood, such as we had seen in

the mountains near Cosseir. At a quarter past eleven, going due N. we

entered a narrow valley, in which we passed two wells on our left, and

following the windings through this valley, all of deep sand, we came

to a large pool of excellent water, called Umgwat, sheltered from the

rays of the sun by a large rock which projected over it, the upper

part of which was shaped like a wedge, and was composed all of green

marble, without the smallest variety or spot of other colour in it.

Through this whole valley, to-day, we had seen the bodies of the

Tucorory who had followed Mahomet Towash, and been scattered by

the Bishareen, and left to perish with thirst there. None of them,

however, as far as we could observe, had ever reached this well. In

the water we found a bird of the duck kind called Teal, or Widgeon.

The Turk Ismael was preparing to shoot at it with his blunderbuss, but

I desired him to refrain, being willing, by its flight, to endeavour

to judge something of the nearness of the Nile. We raised it therefore

by sudden repeated cries, which method was likely to make it seek

its home straight, and abandon a place it must have been a stranger

to. The bird flew straight west, rising as he flew, a sure proof

his journey was a long one, till at last, being very high and at a

distance, he vanished from our sight, without descending or seeking to

approach the earth; from which I drew an unpleasant inference that we

were yet far from the Nile, as was really the case.

Here we threw away the brackish water that remained in our girbas,

and filled them with the wholesome element drawn from this pool of

Umgwat. I could not help reproaching Idris with the inaccuracy of the

information he had pretended to give us the day before, that no party

above ten men could meet us at any of these wells, as none of them

could supply water for more; whereas in this pool there was certainly

enough of excellent water to serve a whole tribe of Arabs for a month.

He had little to say, further than that Haimer, though near, was a

scanty well, and perhaps we should not find water there at all. He

trusted, however, if our people would take heart, we were out of all

danger from Arabs, or any thing else.

At a quarter past three we left the well, and continued along a sandy

valley, which is called Waadi Umgwat. This night it was told me that

Georgis, and the Turk Ismael, were both so ill, and so desponding,

that they had resolved to pursue the journey no farther, but submit to

their destiny, as they called it, and stay behind and die. It was with

the utmost difficulty I could get them to lay aside this resolution,

and the next morning I promised they should ride by turns upon one

of the camels, a thing that none of us had yet attempted. They had,

indeed, often desired me to do so, but I well knew, if I had set them

that example, besides destroying the camels, it would have had the

very worst effect upon their dastardly spirits; and, indeed, we very

soon saw the bad effects of this humane consideration for the two

invalids.

On the 24th, at half past six in the morning we left Umgwat, following

the windings of sandy valleys between stony hills. At half past nine

we found Mahomet Aga's horse dead. The poor creature seemed, without

a guide, to have followed exactly enough the tract of the wells and

way to Egypt, and had survived all his fellow-travellers. At eleven

o'clock we came to some plains of loose, moving sand, and saw some

pillars in motion, which had not wind to sustain them for any time,

and which gave us, therefore, little concern. At one we alighted near

the well Mour, which was to the N. E. of us. At four we left the well

Mour: At forty minutes after four passed the well itself, which was

then dry; and at a quarter past six we found a dead man, whose corpse

was quite dry, and had been so a considerable time. At seven o'clock

in the evening we alighted at El Haimer, where are the two wells in a

large plain of sand. The water is good. There is another well to the

west of us, but it is bitter and saltish, though more abundant than

either of the other two, which, by filling our skins, we had several

times drained.

On the 25th, at half past seven in the morning we left the well El

Haimer, and at ten o'clock alighted among some acacia-trees, our

camels having ate nothing all night, except the dry bitter roots of

that drug, the senna. While we were attending the camels, and resting

ourselves on the grass, we were surprised at the appearance of a troop

of Arabs all upon camels, who looked like a caravan, each camel having

a small loading behind him. They had two gentle ascents before they

could arrive at the place where we were. The road is between two sandy

hills, at the back of which our camels were feeding in a wood; and

near the road was the well El Haimer, where our skins were lying full

of water. It was necessary then to understand one another before we

allowed them to pass between the sandy hills. Upon the first alarm,

my people all repaired to me, bringing their arms in their hands,

as well those that they carried upon them, as the spare arms, all of

which were primed and charged.

The first question was, what to do with the Bishareen? None of us had

any suspicion of him. We unchained him from the Barbarin, and fastened

his other hand, then gave him to the Tucorory, and made them stand

behind to increase the appearance of our number. I then advanced to

the edge of the hill, and cried out with a loud voice, "Stop! for

you cannot pass here." Whether they understood it I do not know, but

they still persisted in mounting the hill. I again cried, shewing

my firelock, "Advance a step farther and I'll fire." After a short

pause they all dismounted from their camels, and one of them, with

his lance in his hand, came forward till within twenty yards, upon

which Idris immediately knew them, and said, they were Ababdé. "Ababdé

or not, said I, they are seventeen men, and Arabs, and I am not of a

disposition, without further surety, to put myself in their hands as

Mahomet Aga did. I am sure they are perfectly in our power now, as

long as they stand where they are." Idris then told me that he was

married to one of the Ababdè of Shekh Ammer, and he would go and get

a sure word from them. Tell them from me, said I, that I, too, am the

friend of Nimmer their Shekh, and his two sons, and of Shekh Hammam

of Furshout; that I am going into Egypt, have been followed by the

Bishareen, and trust nobody; have twenty men armed with firelocks, and

will do them no harm, provided they consent to pass, one by one, and

give a man for a hostage.

Idris, without arms, having joined the man who had advanced towards

us, went down with him to the body of strangers, and the treaty was

soon agreed to. Two of the principal men among them approaching me

without their lances, and the compliment of peace, "Salam Alicum! and

Alicum Salam!" was given and returned by both sides. They seemed,

however, startled at seeing the Bishareen with both his hands chained;

but I told them, that had no regard to them, and desired Idris to

order their camels to go on; and one of the Barbarins in the meantime

brought them a gourd full of water, and bread, for eating together is

like pledging your faith. They had not heard of the fate of Mahomet

Aga, and seemed very ill-pleased at it, saying, that Abou Bertran

was a thief and a murderer. All the camels being past, I asked them

whither they were going? They said to Atbieh, west of Terfowey, to

gather senna for the government of Cairo. I would very fain have had

them to sell or exchange with me a couple of camels. They said theirs

were not strong; that before they could reach home they would be much

in the same condition with our own; that they were obliged to load

them very heavily, as indeed the bags they had behind them to carry

the senna seemed to indicate their profit was but small, so that the

death of one camel was a most serious loss.

I thought myself obliged in humanity to introduce our prisoner to the

two Ababdé that had remained with us. They said, they intended to take

water at Terfowey, and we told them briefly the accident by which we

came in company with the Bishareen. They, on the contrary, thought

that we had been a party of soldiers from Assouan who apprehended the

Arab. Immediately after which they conversed in the language of Beja,

which is that of the Habab, Suakem, and Masuah. I told them plainly,

that, though I knew that language, I would not suffer them to speak

any but Arabic, understood by us all. They immediately complied, and

then inquired about the position of Abou Bertran and his tribe of

Bishareen. This, too, I would not suffer the Arab to inform them of,

but charged them, as he did also, to tell his wives that he was well,

and ate and drank as we had done, and was within two days of arriving

at Assouan, whence he should be returned to them with the rewards

promised. I then desired him to lay a lance in a manner that the point

should be towards Syene, which they accordingly did, and with a long

needle of 12 inches in a brass box, having an arch of a few degrees

marked on it, I, with the utmost attention, took the direction from

Haimer to Syene N. N. W. or more northerly. I would very willingly

have had it in my power to have made an observation of latitude, but

noon was past; I contented myself, therefore, with keeping my route as

distinctly as possible till the evening.

At 40 minutes past one o'clock we left Haimer, and our friends, the

Ababdé, continued their route, after giving us great praise, as well

for our civility, as our keeping the watch like men, as they expressed

it. At half past eight we alighted at Abou Ferege, a place where there

was very little verdure of any kind. Here, for the first time on our

journey, we met with a cloudy sky, which effectually disappointed my

observation of latitude; but every noon and night I described, in a

rough manner, my course through the day, carrying always a compass,

with a needle about five inches radius, round my neck, by a lace, and

resting in my pocket. I thus found that we had kept the line directly

upon Syene, which the Ababdé Arab had shewed us.

On the 26th, at half after six in the morning we set out from Abou

Ferege, continuing nearly in the same direction upon Syene till eleven

o'clock, when, for the purpose of observation only, I alighted at

a place called Abou Heregi, without water, grass, or food for our

camels. We were exceedingly averse to exertions, and became so weak

and spiritless, that it was not possible to prevail upon our people

to take the large quadrant out of its chest to put it together, and

prepare it for observation. I therefore took a Hadley's quadrant, with

a mixture I had made, which served me better than quick-silver, and

made my observation by reflection at Abou Heregi, and found it in lat.

23°, from which I inferred, with some degree of comfort to myself,

that the longitude of Syene in the French maps is ill laid down, and

that we were now in the direction upon Syene, had no westing to run

down, but the journey must finish in a very few days.

At two o'clock in the afternoon we left Abou Heregi, and at four had

an unexpected entertainment, which filled our hearts with a very

short-lived joy. The whole plain before us seemed thick-covered with

green grass and yellow daisies. We advanced to the place with as

much speed as our lame condition would suffer us, but how terrible

was our disappointment, when we found the whole of that verdure to

consist in senna and coloquintida, the most nauseous of plants, and

the most incapable of being substituted as food for man or beast.

At nine o'clock in the evening we alighted at Saffieha, which is a

ridge of craggy mountains to the S. E. and N. W. The night here

was immoderately cold, and the wind north. We were now very near a

crisis, one way or the other. Our bread was consumed, so that we had

not sufficient for one day more; and though we had camels flesh, yet,

by living so long on bread and water, an invincible repugnance arose

either to smell or taste it. As our camels were at their last gasp, we

had taken so sparingly of water, that, when we came to divide it, we

found it insufficient for our necessities, if Syene was even so near

as we conceived it to be.

Georgis had lost one eye, and was nearly blind in the other. Ismael

and he had both become so stiff by being carried, that they could

not bear to set their feet to the ground; and I may say for myself,

that, though I had supported the wounds in my feet with a patience

very uncommon, yet they were arrived at that height as to be perfectly

intolerable, and, as I apprehended, on the point of mortification. The

bandage, which the Bishareen had tied about the hollow of my foot, was

now almost hidden by the flesh swelling over it. Three large wounds on

the right foot, and two on the left, continued open, whence a quantity

of lymph oozed continually. It was also with the utmost difficulty

we could get out the rag, by cutting it to shreds with scissars. The

tale is both unpleasant and irksome. Two soles which remained from

our sandals, the upper leathers of which had gone to pieces in the

sand near Gooz, were tied with a cotton cloth very adroitly by the

Bishareen. But it seemed impossible that I could walk further, even

with this assistance, and therefore we determined to throw away the

quadrant, telescopes, and time-keeper, and save our lives, by riding

the camels alternately. But Providence had already decreed that

we should not terminate this dangerous journey by our own ordinary

foresight and contrivance, but owe it entirely to his visible support

and interposition.

On the 27th, at half past five in the morning we attempted to raise

our camels at Saffieha by every method that we could devise, but all

in vain, only one of them could get upon his legs, and that one did

not stand two minutes till he kneeled down, and could never be raised

afterwards. This the Arabs all declared to be the effects of cold;

and yet Fahrenheit's thermometer, an hour before day, stood at 42°.

Every way we turned ourselves death now stared us in the face. We had

neither time nor strength to waste, nor provisions to support us. We

then took the small skins that had contained our water, and filled

them as far as we thought a man could carry them with ease; but after

all these shifts, there was not enough to serve us three days, at

which I had estimated our journey to Syene, which still however was

uncertain. Finding, therefore, the camels would not rise, we killed

two of them, and took so much flesh as might serve for the deficiency

of bread, and, from the stomach of each of the camels, got about

four gallons of water, which the Bishareen Arab managed with great

dexterity. It is known to people conversant with natural history,

that the camel has within him reservoirs in which he can preserve

drink for any number of days he is used to. In those caravans, of long

course, which come from the Niger across the desert of Selima, it is

said that each camel, by drinking, lays in a store of water that will

support him for forty days. I will by no means be a voucher of this

account, which carries with it an air of exaggeration; but fourteen

or sixteen days, it is well known, an ordinary camel will live, though

he hath no fresh supply of water. When he chews the cud, or when he

eats, you constantly see him throw, from this repository, mouthfuls

of water to dilute his food; and nature has contrived this vessel

with such properties, that the water within it never putrifies, nor

turns unwholesome. It was indeed vapid, and of a bluish cast, but had

neither taste nor smell.

The small remains of our miserable stock of black bread and dirty

water, the only support we had hitherto lived on amidst the burning

sands, and our spirits likewise, were exhausted by an uncertainty

of our journey's end. We were surrounded among those terrible and

unusual phænomena of nature which Providence, in mercy to the

weakness of his creatures, has concealed far from their sight in

deserts almost inaccessible to them. Nothing but death was before

our eyes; and, in these terrible moments of pain, suffering, and

despair, honour, instead of relieving me, suggested still what was to

be an augmentation to my misfortune; the feeling this produced fell

directly upon me alone, and every other individual of the company was

unconscious of it.

The drawings made at Palmyra and Baalbec for the king, were, in

many parts of them, not advanced farther than the outlines, which I

had carried with me, that, if leisure or confinement should happen,

I might finish them during my travels in case of failure of other

employment, so far at least, that, on my return through Italy, they

might be in a state of receiving further improvement, which might

carry them to that perfection I have since been enabled to conduct

them. These were all to be thrown away, with other not less valuable

papers, and, with my quadrant, telescopes, and time-keeper, abandoned

to the rude and ignorant hands of robbers, or to be buried in the

sands. Every memorandum, every description, sketch, or observation

since I departed from Badjoura and passed the desert to Cosseir, till

I reached the present spot, were left in an undigested heap, with our

carrion-camels, at Saffieha, while there remained with me, in lieu of

all my memoranda, but this mournful consideration, that I was now to

maintain the reality of these my tedious perils, with those who either

did, or might affect, from malice and envy, to doubt my veracity upon

my _ipse dixit_ alone, or abandon the reputation of the travels which

I had made with so much courage, labour, danger, and difficulty, and

which had been considered as desperate and impracticable to accomplish

for more than 2000 years.

I would be understood not to mean by this, that my thoughts were at

such a time in the least disturbed with any reflection on the paltry

lies that might be propagated in malignant circles, which has each

its idol, and who, meeting, as they say, for the advancement of

learning, employ themselves in blasting the fame of those who must be

allowed to have surpassed them in every circumstance of intrepidity,

forethought, and fair achievement. The censure of these lion-faced and

chicken-hearted critics never entered as an ingredient in my sorrows

on that occasion in the sadness of my heart; if I had not possessed

a share of spirit enough to despise these, the smallest trouble that

occurred in my travels must have overcome a mind so feebly armed. My

sorrows were of another kind, that I should, of course, be deprived

of a considerable part of an offering I meant as a mark of duty to

my sovereign, that, with those that knew and esteemed me, I should

be obliged to run in debt for the credit of a whole narrative of

circumstances, which ought, from their importance to history and

geography, to have a better foundation than the mere memory of any

man, considering the time and variety of events which they embraced;

and, above all, I may be allowed to say, I felt for my country, that

chance alone, in this age of discovery, had robbed her of the fairest

garland of this kind she ever was to wear, which all her fleets, full

of heroes and men of science, in all the oceans they might be destined

to explore, were incapable of replacing upon her brow. These sad

reflections were mine, and confined to myself. Luckily my companions

were no sharers in them; they had already, in their own sufferings,

much more than their little stock of fortitude, philosophy, or

education enabled them to bear.