Saw Rais in the evening, and had a sort of confidential conversation with him, and told him for the first time of my intention to proceed further in the interior. Of course, he had heard of it before from his servants. Nevertheless, he affected great surprise and sorrow. But, when I told him I might return in six months hence, he became more calm. He then persuaded me by all means to avoid the routes of the Touaricks, and proceed to Fezzan, thence to Bornou. Speaking of the Ghadamsee merchants and their friends and correspondents, Messrs. Silva, Labe, Shaloum, and Francovich, in Tripoli, he said, "Your merchants exchange products with the Ghadamseeah in the way of barter, and make a great deal of money, whilst the Ghadamseeah have no money left, none at all." He wondered, like the Touaricks, what the Christians do with all the senna. He expected the Shânbah, on the route of Ghat, in a few days' time. I observed, "People are all superbly dressed, and there was not much appearance of poverty." He smiled, and said, "The people are sheytan (very cunning), they lay up their new clothes, and only wear them on festivals." Speaking of slaves, his Excellency said, "There is now no profit on slaves. Government takes ten mahboubs duty on each. A good slave fetches 40,000 wadâ (cowries) in Soudan, usual price 30,000, and some as low as 15,000. A good slave sells in Ghadames for forty mahboubs." The Rais told me to take care of the vermin, and abused the filthiness of the people. If I escape the Touaricks and the fevers as well as I escape the vermin, which abound on the clothes of all the people without exception, I shall consider myself fortunate. The inhabitants of Ghadames make no scruple in attacking the enemy in the public streets, which stick to them closer than their dearest friends. I attribute my escape to my being an infidel, for their orthodox l-i-c-e won't have anything to do with Kafers.
People look worse than during the Ramadan. Poor creatures, they have little to eat; they say they have nothing but barley-meal and dates to eat, for the Turks have taken away all their money. Some, however, as a luxury, which their relations and friends send them from Soudan, masticate ghour[44]-nuts, and which I believe is the kolat, or colat-nut of Caillié. The Arabs called these nuts the "Coffee of Soudan." Konja is a great place for the growth of the ghour, two or three months west of Kanou.
5th.—Weather gets colder every day. I was reflecting on the best situation for a Consul in Northern Sahara. The point would be Touat, the nucleus of many routes, the great highways of commerce in The Desert. From this point a British Consul could keep a sharp look-out on the French, moving southward.
A Mussulman doctor told me with great solemnity this morning, that five hundred years were necessary to go round the world. Two hundred years desert (ك٘لع), or nothing, or containing—
"(God's) dark materials to create more worlds."
Two hundred years of seas. Eighty years of Gog and Magog. Eighteen years of Soudan. And two years of white people, including Christians and Mohammedans. There were countries full of Mussulmans which had not been visited by the Mussulmans of Turkey or Africa. They had been visited by one man only, Alexander the Great. Certainly the Moors read history backwards. On asking where this information was to be obtained, he said, "From the Tăfseer (Commentaries) of the Koran."
The Touaricks who have just arrived are men of very large stature, and as "straight as a dart." Several of them are full six feet high. Such men are alone produced in the Sahara! All the weak and the diseased soon die off, leaving behind only the robust. They walk about the streets with an air of consummate pride, with their huge broad swords swung at the back, and their lances in their hands, like "a tall pine."
An Arab, just arrived from Derge, brings intelligence that the Ghadamsee people who were in Tunis are returning home viâ Tripoli. These are mostly poor labourers, who go a few months to Tunis to amass a little capital, with which to trade afterwards. The Ghadamsee is constantly going on these journeys of profit and enterprize, either as merchant or labourer. His Desert home is the pulse of all his distant enterprises, whither he retires to end his days, dedicating the last hours of his existence to God. The Arab came from Derge, mounted on a good horse, in the short time of thirteen hours,—by camels it occupies two and two-and-a-half days! The Arab told me he killed, a few days ago, six ostriches near Derge. The oases of Derge consist of four little oases, or districts, viz., Derge (proper), Terghuddah, Madress, and Fiffelt, containing an Arab population of 400 souls, a hardy and brave people. Water is plentiful, but there are no hot springs. A native told me, that invariably any stranger drinking this water, was attacked with fever. Generally these little oases are very unhealthy. Some assert that all who visit the oases are taken ill. Probably, like Mourzuk, they lay low, in a wady or hollowed plain. Date-trees are numerous, and bear good fruit. A fair quantity of wheat and ghusub is grown. Besides sheep, and goats, and fowls, there is a few camels. The people are occupied in the gardens, but too numerous for the oases; they are very poor, and obliged to emigrate. Derge is in the more eastern route of Zantan and Rujban; and when that of Seenawan, the western, is not safe, this, the longer route, is taken.
6th.—Slept badly during the night; restless about my journey. Determined now to take the Fezzan route. Weather very soft, with murky clouds.
Relating to my taleb, that, formerly, Mussulmans conquered Christians, but now, all the countries of the Mediterranean were fast falling back again into the hands of the Christians—such being the will of God, he consoled himself by replying: "That, in less than forty years will rise up one Abou Abdullah Mohammed El-Arbee El-Korashee El-Fatamee, (ابو عبد الله محمّد القرشي الفاطمي,) who will kill all the Christians, both of the new[45] and the old world; that this will be the golden age; all people will be Mussulmans, and all will be rich and powerful, enjoying the abundance of this world's good things; and the very dust of the earth, and the sand of the Sahara, will be turned into gold and silver: But, (the awful but!) that this will only last one generation, or forty years; for then will arise The Dajal! who, mounting upon an ass, will scour the earth in three days, and kill and destroy all the Mussulmans, this Dajal being the Messiah of the Jews, who will all flock to his standard; and that then will appear Jesus, the Son of Mary[46], from the top of the mountains of the moon, after Dajal has reigned forty years, and slay this monster Messiah of the Jews. Now there will appear Gog and Magog, let loose from Jibel Kaf, in Khoristan, and the country of the Turks and Russians. And last of all will come the end, when the Wahabites will carry all the Jews into hell-fire on their backs." Such are the secret consolations of a good and orthodox Mussulman of The Sahara. A part of this monstrous fable has been related before, with some variations. The gist of the prophecy is, the destruction of the Christians by another Arab Conqueror. Here the now humbled follower of the Prophet finds his sweet revenge. The same revenge the more ignorant and fanatic of the Jews seek and cherish in the advent of their long-expected Messiah, who is to enable them to put their feet upon the necks of all people—all the nations of the earth. But the better class of Israelites are willing to believe that the Gentile nations may enjoy a portion of the blessings of Messiah's reign, and will not be effaced from the earth. Some pious Christians, who, failing to convert men to their peculiar views of revelation, anticipate the appearance quickly of a sort of Buonaparte Messiah, armed with similar attributes, who is to involve all infidel nations in seas of blood, and make the world a heap of Saharan desolation. Such views of Christianity have always been abhorrent to my feelings; and I have kept close to the fair and pacific pictures of Messiah's reign, so beautifully set forth by Pope:—
