In the streets, people appeared to be fasting, as in the most rigid Ramadan. I never saw such gloomy, emaciated faces. Really people look as if they were all going to give up the ghost. What is to become of these poor devils of dervishes! Government is grinding them down to the dust! Returned home heart-sick at the sight. I am growing daily more impatient of remaining so long in Ghadames. Impatience comes on like attacks of fever. Have determined again to pursue the Kanou route.
The forty slaves brought by the Touaricks and the Tibboo have been all sold to the Souafah. The Tibboo sold his for twenty dollars per head. The ten dollars per head tax on them put the Rais in possession of a little ready money, and his Excellency paid me back the hundred Tunisian piastres. The Arabs of Souf always bring money here, and, besides dollars, a quantity of five-franc pieces, since the French have occupied Algeria. The millions spent or wasted by the French in Algeria are variously disposed of:—
1st.—The Arabs get a fifth, who bury their money, or send it into the neighbouring deserts of Tunis and Morocco.
2nd. The Maltese ship off a ninth of the money to Malta. The Spaniards and other foreigners also get a share.
3rd. A great quantity, a fifth, perhaps, is embezzled by the employés of the civil administration, and their creatures, the contractors.
4th. A tenth is spent on the public works.
5th. The rest is paid to the military. A fraction only is spent on the culture of the soil, and for the purposes of emigration, or the real colonization of the country.
15th.—This morning is really cold, and the coldest morning we have had yet. Rais assures me I shall with difficulty be able to bear the cold, so intense is it in Ghadames during the winter, or January and February. Greatly agitated about my journey in the past night, and could not sleep. There will soon be an end of this uncertainty. I pray God to give me patience and wisdom. Observe people are beginning to feel the effects of the cold, and cover up their mouths like the Italians and Spaniards. But all are living up to the starvation-point.
At noon was held a full Divan, to decide upon the "extraordinary demand." The chiefs of the people said:—"We have no money, and cannot pay." The Rais replied:—"Such discourse will not do; you have money, and must pay." Then the Divan broke up without farther palavering. The alleged object of the money to be raised, is for the expenses of the troops who went in pursuit of the Arabs of the son of Abd-el-Geleel in the past summer.
The old bandit calls and says:—"Your friend, the long man, has finished to-day all his tobacco." The long man is the Giant Touarick. I took no notice of this polite hint to furnish a new supply. I might furnish with tobacco all the Touaricks who came here, if I were to attend to these Irish hints. The old bandit, who is cramped up like a wizened apple, is said by people still to carry on his nefarious trade. The proof of this they give to be, his always going alone when he travels. The old villain then catches what he can. Myself, I hardly believe he continues his brigandage. He appears wholly worn out. I gave his little son 20 paras to buy camel's flesh. The old freebooter grinned a ghastly smile. Walking in Ben Weleed quarters, I heard a great to-do, and went to see what it was, when I saw the old chief, Haj Ben Mousa Ettanee, standing over his young truant son, whilst with a thick stick the servant of the schoolmaster was belabouring the feet of the child. Never was a more complete bastinadoing. The urchin cried to his father for mercy. It was perfectly in character with the old man, and the austere manners of his family. I do not wonder that all the people read and write in Ghadames, when such severity is practised by the very aristocrats of the city. Whilst standing by, another Moor went up to the old man, and said, "Stop, stop, here's the Christian looking on." They stopped, but it appeared a mere pretence for leaving off, for already they had unmercifully belaboured the truant.
