10th.—Did not sleep very well, and felt very cold during the night. But as soon as the sun is up it is hot. Such is The Desert. It is also cold in the shade, and hot in the sun. When riding, a hot wind burns the one cheek, and a cold wind blanches the other cheek[31]. You wander through these extremes like the spirits of the nethermost regions,—
"And feel by turns the bitter change Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce: From beds of raging fire, to starve in ice— Thence hurried back to fire."
I usually am obliged to wear my cloak out of the sun, besides a woollen burnouse.
Visited the marabet, or mausoleum, of Sidi Bou Salah, about two hundred paces from the large spring. My Fezzanee guide told me the daughter of the buried Marabout was still living in the oasis, but his sons were residing in Fezzan. When the corn was reaped, late in the spring, he himself should return to Fezzan. One or two persons would remain here. The tomb of the Marabout is enclosed within the usual square little house, having a dome or cupola roof, but it is not clean whitewashed, as these sanctuaries generally are on the Coast. On the tomb is a coverlet of particoloured and showy silks. The room of the mausoleum is snug and clean. A little lamp is kept burning at the head during the night. This is a sort of perpetual fire. There are two or three outhouses, or rooms, adjoining, in which, if anything be deposited, it is quite safe, it is sacred, no robbers in these wild countries being bold enough to commit such a sacrilege against the God of the Islamites. The entire oasis is peculiarly protected by the halo of the awful Marabout here buried. It is a place of perfect security for all travellers. In this way the sentiment of religion confers its advantages, whatever may be the creed of its professors. No doubt the sentiment of religion, as connected with superstition, inflicts upon mankind intolerable evils; but here, at any rate, is some compensation.
I surveyed again the great thermal spring. The water issues from a rocky ferruginous soil of iron ore, giving the water a mineral taste. Yet it is of the best quality. Apparently the water descends from the neighbouring mountain chains, and collects here, but its flow or stream is perennial. From this little eminence I had a panoramic view of the country, and was gratefully affected with the beautiful situation of the oasis. In the hands of Europeans, a city would be created here, one of the largest of The Great Desert, for water abounds on every side. This oasis would become the centre of a dense population, fed from the products of the soil. A mart of commerce would concentrate a great Saharan traffic, ramifying through every part of Africa. But what can be expected from people whose one predominant and quasi-religious idea teaches them that everything should remain as it is; as it was before so shall it be hereafter. People nevertheless pretend that political causes keep the oasis in its present miserable condition. Serdalas belongs to the Touaricks, who let it out to the Fezzaneers, but will not permit them to plant date-palms, lest the oasis should flourish and rival Ghat, and so injure that mart of commerce. Be it as it may, man always fails of his work, and if he does so in the more genial climes of Europe, what can come of his idleness and his improvidence in The Vast African Desert? Desolate as The Sahara may be in its essential character, it is rendered still more so by the neglect of its heedless and dreamy tenants. Many are the oases in this neglected, abandoned state. And the saddening, sickening thought often recurs to me, that, however desolate The Sahara may have been in past ages, it is now getting worse instead of better. Ghadames, and many oases of Fezzan, are dwindling away to nothing, the population lessening, and dispersing under the curse of the Turkish system!
Fezzan is only reckoned five days from Serdalas, good travelling, but, with a caravan of slaves, it will occupy us six or seven days. How fond of lying are the Moors, or, shall we say, boasting? The Shereef, I hear from my other companions, is not going on a pilgrimage to Mecca, as he boasted to me. He merely goes to Tripoli on a trip to sell his three slaves for the Governor, his uncle, and purchase a little merchandise in return.
Had a visit from the daughter of the Marabout, the wild Sybil of The Desert. She is an Arab lady of some seventy or more years of age, but, like most ladies, does not know how old she is. At first sight of her, I
"Gaz'd on her sun-burnt face with silent awe, Her tatter'd mantle, Her moving lips,—
"Whose dark eyes flash'd, through locks of blackest shade."
The Pythoness asked me how I liked her country, a hundred times, and then begged for something in the name of Allah. She kept saying, "What have you got for the daughter of the great Marabout?" "What have you got for her who dedicates her life to God?" She was very proud of the distinction, Bent-El-Marabout ("daughter of the Marabout"). And why should she not be proud? When all comes to all, the Saharan lady is as good as a Roman Nepote of the Pope. She continued, "What have you got for the daughter of the great Marabout?" And, indeed, I had got very little. I then gave her a little looking-glass, the only one I had. But this is no privation in The Desert, however necessary elsewhere. The looking-glass exceedingly delighted the sybil, for in it she saw the stern features of her face, with her dauntless eye. She then got familiar. She wondered why I was not married, and how I could go to sleep without a wife. She prayed me to take one from Fezzan, or buy a negress of the caravan, telling the people, "The Christian is very good, but very foolish. The Christian has plenty of money, and does not buy a wife." I told her it was prohibited to buy slaves. And as to a wife, I could not carry her about in The Desert. To which she at length, after much persuasion, consented to agree. The daughter of the Marabout showed no hostility against me as a Christian, although of such pure blood, and in which the antagonism of the eastern to the western spirit is supposed to be stronger. She gave me her blessing, and we parted friends. The only piece of dress of any kind which the Maraboutess wore was a thick, dark, woollen frock, with short sleeves. She had no ornaments; her hair was black, mixed with grey, long, and dishevelled about her neck and shoulders. An air of the Pythoness overshadows the countenance and carriage of this Desert priestess. Amongst the people she is a holy being. She lives alone. She has the power of foretelling future events. She receives small presents from all the ghafalahs which visit the oasis, as tithes of the Marabout shrine. She never leaves this Desert spot. Her person was ever inviolable. It is related that, many years ago, an Arab once attempted to surprise her in the night, and share a part of her bed, but was immediately struck dead before he could stretch out his hand to open the door of her grass-built hut. So The Desert has its incorruptible vestals. But the conversation which her ladyship had with me was all pro-matrimonial, and would not have suggested to the stranger that she was an ancient maiden of inviolate chastity. Perhaps she might have thought this sort of conversation would please me best. The Maraboutess, as well as the few Fezzaneers in Serdalas, are of short stature, of a very dark-brown complexion, approaching nearly to black, and some have the broad distended nostrils of the negro. The Shereef said to me this afternoon, "I'm going to pray at the Marabout shrine; I go happily, I return happily." Our Shereef is a little self-righteous.
