“In the name of Allah who has sent you, subdued to my orders, I pray you, Oh! spirits, to go back whence you came. I pray Allah to preserve you for ever to do good and to fulfil all that is asked of you.”
Later on, while staying at Luxor, I made another attempt to witness the mandal. This time I was rather more successful.
The dawa, so far as I could see, was practically the same as the invocation of the magician in Dakhla; but the Sheykh el Afrit made no attempt to be impressive, and went through the performance in the most perfunctory manner. The boy appeared to be merely bored, and anxious only to earn his bakhshish, and to get away again and play.
When he had finished the incantations, the magician asked the boy what he saw in the ink. He replied that he saw a broom sweeping the ground. The magician told him that, when the sweeping was finished, he was to tell “them” (presumably the spirits) to pitch a tent.
After a short interval, during which the boy attentively watched the ink, he said that the tent was pitched. He was then told to command them to place seven chairs in it. When the boy declared that this had been done, he was told that they were to summon the seven kings. Shortly after, the boy declared that the kings had arrived and were seated on the chairs.
The Sheykh el Afrit then asked me what it was I wanted to know. I told him I wished the boy to tell me of what I was thinking, and I pictured to myself a young man of the Tawarek race I had once met in the desert.
The boy peered into the ink for some time before answering. Then, in a rather hesitating voice, said that he saw a woman.
I asked if she were veiled. The boy replied that she was. I told him to describe the veil. He said it was black, and in two parts, one covering the lower part of her face and the other the upper portion.
This was correct. The man I had seen was wearing the usual litham, or mask, carried by his race, consisting of a long strip of black cotton, wrapped twice round his head, the lower strip covering his face up to the level of his eyes and the upper one concealing his forehead, a narrow opening being left between the two through which he could see.
I next asked the boy if he could see the woman’s hair. It was a long time before he replied to this question. Then, in a very doubtful tone, as though he felt he were not describing it properly, he said he could see it sticking up from the top of her head.