Chapter XXI: Book VIII (9)

Notwithstanding our boatmen had a very bad character at this time, we passed with our camels and baggage without loss or accident. They seemed indeed to shew a very indifferent countenance at first, but good words, and a promise of recompence, presently rendered them tractable. By half past twelve we were all safe on the other side, and at thirty-five minutes past three we arrived at Halifoon, about five miles from the ferry on the east side of the Nile. One mark of the boatmen's attention I cannot but mention: The weather was very hot, and we had plenty of time; the water being clear and tempting, I proposed swimming over to the other side for the pleasure of bathing; but they, one and all, opposed my design with great violence, and would not suffer me to undress. They said there was a multitude of crocodiles in the river near that place, and although they were not large enough to kill, or carry off a camel, they very often wounded them, and it would be a wonder if we passed without seeing them; indeed the last boat had not reached the shore before two of them rose in the middle of the stream. I made what haste I could to get a gun, and fired at the largest, but, as far as I could judge, without effect.

On the 22d, at three o'clock in the afternoon we left Halifoon, and by ten at night came to Halfaia, a large, handsome, and pleasant town, although built with clay. The houses are terrassed at the tops, their inhabitants being no longer afraid of the rains, which have been for some time here very inconsiderable. The Battaheen were encamped near Umdoom, a large village on the side of the river, about seven miles from Halifoon. They are a thievish, pilfering set, and we passed them early in the morning, before it was light. The road is very pleasant, through woods of acacia-trees, interspersed with large fields covered with bent grass. At Umdoom we found troops of women going to their morning occupation, that of gathering seeds to make bread.

The command of Mahomet Wed Ageeb is very extensive. It reaches from this passage of the river at Halifoon on the south, as far as Wed Baal a Nagga on the north, and to the east as far as the Red Sea, though a great part of those Arabs have been in rebellion, and have not paid their tax for some years. His command on the westward of the river reaches to Korti, all over the desert of Bahiouda, though lately the Beni Gerar, Beni Faisara, and Cubba-beesh, have expelled the ancient Arabs of Bahiouda, who pretend now only to be the subjects of Kordofan. He has also the charge of levying the tribute of horses from Dongola, in which consists the great strength of Sennaar.

Halfaia is the limit of the rains, and is situated upon a large circular peninsula surrounded by the Nile from S. W. to N. W. that is, at all the points of W. It is half a mile, or something more, from the river. This peninsula contains all their sown land, and is not watered by the river, but by what is raised from the stream by wheels turned by oxen. Halfaia consists of about three hundred houses; their principal gain is from a manufacture of very coarse cotton cloth, called Dimour, which serves for small money through all the lower parts of Atbara. There are palm-trees at Halfaia, but they produce no dates. The people here eat cats, also the river-horse and the crocodile, both of which are in great plenty. Halfaia, by many altitudes of the sun and stars, was found to be in lat. 15° 45´ 54´´, and in long. 32° 49´ 15´´ east from the meridian of Greenwich.

On the 29th, at six o'clock in the morning we left Halfaia, and continued our journey about 3 miles and a half further, when we came to two villages, a small one to the north and a large one to the west. The Nile here runs N. E. of us. This whole day was spent in woods of a very pleasant kind; there were large numbers of birds of various colours, but none of them, so far as I could hear since we left Sennaar, endowed with the gift of song. _Sakies_[44] in the plain, all between the Nile and the road, lift the water from the stream, and pour it on the land, in hopes that it may produce some miserable crops of dora; for the river overflows none of this country, and it is very precariously and scantily watered with rain.

In a little time, continuing our journey, we came to Shekh Atman's, the tomb of a Fakir on the road. There is a high ridge of mountains on our left, west of the Nile about five miles, and a low ridge on our right, about eight miles distant; our direction was straight north. At half past eight, about five miles further, we came to the village Wed Hojila. The river Abiad, which is larger than the Nile, joins it there. Still the Nile preserves the name of Bahar el Azergue, or the Blue River, which it got at Sennaar. The village was once intended to be built at the junction of the two rivers, but the Fakir's tomb being on the side of the Nile, the village likewise was placed there. The Abiad is a very deep river; it runs dead and with little inclination, and preserves its stream always undiminished, because rising in latitudes where there are continual rains, it therefore suffers not the decrease the Nile does by the six months dry weather. Our whole journey this day was through woods, with large intervals of sandy plains producing nothing except some few spots of corn sown in time of the showers, while the sun returned over the zenith, but still looking very poorly. At half past twelve we arrived at Suakem, under trees, near a sakia. At four o'clock in the afternoon we left Suakem, the mountains of Gerri bearing N. E. of us, and, five miles further, alighted in a wood near the Arabs Abdelab.

On the 30th, at five o'clock in the morning we left this station, and after having gone eight miles N. E. we came to a village, which is, as it were, the suburb of Gerri. The Acaba of Gerri is a low ridge of rocks that seems first to run from both sides across the bed of the river, as if designed to stop it; and it is impossible to look at the gap through which it falls down below, without thinking that this passage was made by the Nile itself when first it began to flow. Gerri is built on a rising ground, consisting of white, barren sand and gravel, intermixed with white alabaster like pebbles, which, in a bright sun, are extremely disagreeable to the eye. It consists of about 140 houses, none of them above one storey high, neat, well built, flat-roofed, and all of one height, composed with the same coloured earth as that on which it stands, and, for this reason, it is scarcely visible at a distance. It is immediately at the foot of the Acaba, something more than a quarter of a mile from the Nile. Gerri is situated at the end of the tropical rains, in lat. 16° 15´, and the Acaba seems to answer those mountains of Ptolemy, beyond which (that is to the N.) he says it is [Greek: diammon kai abrochon chôran][45], that is, a country full of sand and without rain; it is but a small spot immediately on the Nile, which is all cultivated, as it enjoys the double advantage both of the overflowing of the river and the accidental showers. It is also called Beladullah, or the Country of God, on account of this double blessing. The dates of Gerri are sent to the Mek, and are reserved on purpose for him. They are dry, and never ripen, nor have any of the moist and pulpy substance of the dates of Barbary. They are firm and smooth in the skin, and of a golden colour.

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.