On the present occasion, however, our travellers were embarked on a much shorter journey. A few hours’ ride sufficed to carry them over the waste, and bring them to the oasis of Nefta—of the extreme antiquity of which town the Cadi had the most assured belief. “Nefta,” said he, “was built—or, rather the foundation of it was laid—by Saidna Noah (our Lord Noah): peace be upon him! Here he discovered the first dry spot; and hence he disembarked here, and erected an abode for his family.” The inhabitants of these oases of the Desert are not without their etiquette; and on approaching the town, the Governor assumed his dignified aspect, made his entry with all possible gravity, and was no sooner seated in his own residence than the sheikhs and aristocracy of Nefta assembled to welcome him, some kissing his head, some his shoulder, some his elbow, and some the palm of his hand. The worthy Governor, however, who had a good dash of humour in his composition, loved other things better than etiquette. “No sooner was the assembly dismissed,” says our author, “than our lordly host again resumed his easy and affable manner. When the sound of the feet of the last grandee had died away, Ibrahim rose up, and assumed an attitude which might have been a subject for the study of an artist. There he stood, not unlike what I could fancy a Demosthenes, a Cato, or a Cicero, when on the point of commencing one of their thrilling orations. Ibrahim remained in that position a few seconds, and then turning to us, said, ‘I am glad to be free again. Gentlemen! you no doubt are hungry as well as myself; have you any objection to a good dinner?’”
Having despatched the dinner, which justified the host’s eulogium of it, and reposed for a few hours after their fatigues, Mr Davis and one of his companions set out by themselves to ride all round the oasis of Nefta. “All went on well at first,” he says, “and we even enjoyed our ride along the outskirts of the thick forest of magnificent and majestic date-trees, till we suddenly perceived our horses sinking beneath us. ‘Pull up! pull up!’ screamed my companion; ‘the ground is unsafe!’ We were on the brink of getting on the Kilta, a dangerous swamp, which receives the surplus waters of the head-fountain, after they have supplied the vast date-plantations. The Kilta joins the ‘Sea of Pharaoh,’ and never have I seen anything of a more delusive character. The surface of the swamp had precisely the same appearance as the solid ground; and had we been riding at full speed, we might have perished in this deceitful abyss.” The Ras Elain—“head fountain or spring,”—which is the source of the waad, or river, constitutes the charm and luxury of this delightful oasis. The spring is surrounded on three sides by hillocks, and is embowered amidst a cluster of palm-trees, so thickly and eccentrically placed that our travellers had much difficulty in approaching it so as to taste its waters. Fi kol donya ma atsh’ kaifho’,—“In the whole world there is nothing like it!” exclaimed their guide. “And I must candidly confess,” says Mr Davis, “that though he had never left the locality of his birth, he was pretty correct on this point. Never did I taste more delicious water; and we unanimously agreed that the Neftaweens might well be proud of their Ras Elain. What a boon is this spring, located as it is amidst the burning sands!”
But the great marvel of this district is the mysterious Bakar Faraoon, the “Sea of Pharaoh.” The whole tribes of the vicinity look with awe and terror upon this so-called “sea,” and superstitions innumerable are connected with it. Not only has the army of that wicked monarch after whom the sea is called, perished in it, but hosts of infidel sovereigns, persecutors of the Faithful, with their myriads of warriors, been engulfed in it, and are still sinking down its bottomless abyss! Such are the reports of the Moslems, confirmed by the weighty asseverations of our author’s learned friend, the Cadi of Nefta. “Not only have numberless armies been seen marching and re-marching on its surface by night,” said that erudite expounder of the Koran, “but repeatedly have they been seen during broad daylight. Giants on monstrously large horses, have been seen galloping about in various directions, advancing and receding, and then suddenly disappearing again in that ‘sea.’”
“‘Have you ever, my Lord Cadi, seen any of those submarine warriors?’
Cadi.—‘No, I never have.’
‘Can you mention any trustworthy person of your acquaintance who has?’
Cadi.—‘I certainly cannot.’
‘Then what evidence have you for the truth of those marvellous apparitions?’
Cadi.—‘Every one believes in all I have told you.’
‘Is it not possible that all this belief may be the result of the fevered imagination of some superstitious individual?’