Sheriff Hameit, to whom I had sent Abiddin’s letter the evening before, answered us very impolitely, declaring that his religion forbade him to have anything to do with infidels.
I consoled myself for this fresh failure by having a chat with the little Kunta Tahar, Mohamed’s companion, who had come on to Gungi to see that the rice was duly handed over to us.
He told me of the death in 1890 near Saredina of Abiddin, the son of Hamet Beckay, of whom he had been a faithful retainer when at Gardio near Lake Debo.
This Abiddin and his followers had come to make a pilgrimage to the tomb of the great marabout, and also to try to win recruits against the Toucouleurs of Massina, with whom Abiddin carried on the struggle begun by his father. Two columns had marched forth against them, one from Mopti, the other from Jenné, and surrounded them. Abiddin was wounded and taken prisoner, but his faithful Bambaras of Jenné, who had always followed his fortunes, rescued him from the hands of the enemy. But, alas! no less than three bullets hit the doomed man after this first escape, killing him on the spot, and a great storm then arose which put an end to the battle, only a few of those engaged in it escaping to tell the tale.
The wind, which was very violent and dry, whirled up such quantities of sand that the corpse of Abiddin was buried beneath it, and no one was ever able to discover the place where he lay, as if Nature herself wished to protect his body from desecration and insult.
WEAVERS AT GUNGI.
Tornadoes play a great part in the histories of Kunta wars. Hamet Beckay is supposed to have had the power of calling them up when he liked, and to have by their means several times overwhelmed armies sent to attack him, but that of Saredina came too late to save his son.
Can it have been the story told to me by my friend the Kunta which caused a tremendous tornado to sweep down upon us that very evening, with thunder and lightning and torrents of rain all complete, soaking everything and everybody on board?
Our rice shelled, put into bags, and stowed away in the hold, we went on and anchored the next morning opposite Baruba to breakfast there. The ancient town, the Kaaba of the Tuaregs, which was still standing in the time of Barth, has since been destroyed, but its site is marked by piles of rubbish such as are still characteristic of the environs of Timbuktu, and from their vast extent prove that it was a city of considerable importance.