The poorer people who constantly live there, are either of the province called Zeghawa, or Arabs.
In Kourma, the merchants who occupy almost the whole of the place, are called the Jeiâra, most of them born in the Upper Egypt. Exclusively of them and their dependents, the number of people in that town is inconsiderable. Twice in the week a market is held there for meat and other provisions, as at Cobbé.
Cubcabîa is a considerable town, and its inhabitants various and numerous. It forms the key of the Western roads, as Sweini of the Northern; and is the depôt of all the merchandize that is brought from that quarter. A market is held there twice a week, in which the chief medium of exchange for articles of small value is salt, which the inhabitants make by collecting and boiling the earth of those places where horses, asses, or other animals have been long stationary. This market is celebrated for the quantity of tokeas, and for the manufacture, if so it may be called, of leather, which they are very dextrous in stripping of the hair, tanning, and then forming into large and durable sacks for corn, (geraubs,) water, (ray,) and other purposes. The tokeas are cotton cloths, of five, six, or eight yards long, and eighteen to twenty-two inches wide: they are strong but coarse, and form the covering of all the lower class of both sexes. The inhabitants are partly Fûrians, who speak their own language, in part Arabs, and partly from some of the Western countries, as Bergoo, &c. There are also some of the race called Felatîa, and other descriptions.
In Cours are found some merchants from the river; the remainder are fukkara, who affect extraordinary sanctity, and are distinguished for their intolerance and brutality to strangers. Rîl is inhabited partly by Fûrians; but there are also some foreign merchants. During the reign of Sultan Teraub there appear to have been many more there; for he had built a house, and made the town his usual residence in time of peace. But Abd-el-rachmân has abandoned it, probably from the fear attendant on usurpation. Rîl[40] is the key of the South and East roads, as Cubcabîa of the West, and Sweini of the North; and therefore a Melek with a body of troops commonly resides there, as a guard to the frontier, and to keep the Arabs, who abound in that neighbourhood, in subjection. It is a place eminently fitted for the Imperial residence, being abundantly supplied with fresh water from a large pool, which is never completely dry, with bread from Saïd[41], with meat, milk, and butter from the Arabs, who breed cattle, and with vegetables from a soil well adapted to horticulture; nor are they without a kind of tenacious clay, which, with little preparation, becomes a durable material for building. In Shoba, another town of some note, was an house of Sultan Teraub. The place is said to be well supplied with water, and there are some chalk pits near it, from which that material was drawn at the time I was in the country. These pits were then almost exhausted, for the purpose of adorning the royal residence, and some others, with a kind of white-wash. In Shoba reside some jelabs; the rest of the people are Fûrians, and occupied in other pursuits.
Gidîd has also a competent supply of water, and is near the road from Cobbé to Rîl. Its bearing from the former is South-east. It is a town of Fukkara, who are reported to be so little famous for hospitality, that they will hardly furnish to a traveller water to allay his thirst. In this town are many houses, and some of them belong to merchants who derive their origin from the Eastward.
Gellé was esteemed less flourishing than most other towns of Dar-Fûr, being under the galling tyranny of a priest. The Faqui Seradge, one of the two principal Imams of the Sultan, a man of intrigue and consummate hypocrisy, had gained an ascendancy over his master, and distanced all competitors at court. Gellé was his native place, and the people of the town were become his dependents. His unsated avarice left them neither apparel nor a mat to lie on; and his immortal malice persecuted them for having no more to plunder. The greater part of the people are either Corobâti or Felatîa (two tribes); of the latter sort is the faqui.
The greater part of the people inhabiting Cobbé consists, as hath been already observed, of merchants. The generality of them are employed in trading to Egypt, and some of them are natives of that country; but the greater number come from the river. The latter class, if from circumstances a conjecture may be hazarded, seem first to have opened the direct communication between Egypt and Fûr. For many years their native countries, Dongola, Mahas, and all the borders of the Nile as far as Sennaar, which, according to report, are in all the gifts of nature much superior to Dar-Fûr, have been the scene of devastation and bloodshed, having no settled government, but being continually torn by internal divisions, and harassed by the inroads of the Shaikié and other tribes of Arabs, who inhabit the region between the river and the Red Sea. Such of the natives as were in a condition to support themselves by traffic, or by manual labour, in consequence emigrated, and many of them retired to the West. These people, accustomed in their native country to a short and easy communication with Egypt, and impelled by the prospect of immense profit, which a farther attempt of the same kind promised them, opened the route which the Jelabs now pursue. But to return to Cobbé.—
Some Egyptians, chiefly from Saïd, a few Tunisines, natives of Tripoli, and others, come and go with the caravans, only remaining long enough to sell their goods. Others have married in Dar-Fûr, and are now perfectly naturalized, and recognized as subject to the Sultan. The fathers being no more, the children are in many instances established in their room, and are engaged in the same occupations.
The remainder of them consists of foreigners, coming from Dongola, Mahas, Sennaar, and Kordofân, who are generally remarked as indefatigable in commerce, but daring, restless, and seditious, (which consideration has induced the present Sultan to use some efforts to banish them from his dominions,) and the offspring of those whose parents have emigrated, and who are themselves born in Dar-Fûr. The latter are often people of debauched manners, and not remarkable for the same spirit of enterprise as the actual emigrates. Gradually formed to the despotism which coerces their external deportment, and seeks to crush and sterilize even the seeds of energy, somewhat of the spirit of their progenitors yet remains: the affections indeed are turned askance, but not eradicated. The pushes that should have been made ad auras æthereas, opposed revert to Tartarus. The luxuriancy of mental vigour, though repulsed and forcibly inverted, still extends its ramifications. Its pallescent shoots pierce the dunghill, when not permitted to open themselves to the influence of the sun. The active mind may descend to brutal sensuality, when it can no longer expand itself in a more sane exercise.
The people first mentioned commonly among themselves use the language of Barabra, though they also speak Arabic. The latter are generally unacquainted with any language but the Arabic. They usually intermarry with each other, or with the Arabs. Some of them avoid marrying, and cohabit only with their slaves, seldom taking to wife a Fûrian woman. Both these descriptions of men are easily distinguishable from the natives of the country[42], being usually of a more olive complexion, and having a form of visage more nearly resembling the European, with short curly black hair, but not wool. They are a well-sized and well-formed people, and have often an agreeable and expressive countenance, though sometimes indicating (if so much faith may be given to physiognomy) violent passions and a mutable temper. Such are the inhabitants of Cobbé. South-east of the town, in a large open space adapted to the purpose, a market[43] is held twice in the week, (Monday and Friday,) in which are sold provisions of every kind, and, in short, all the commodities which the country produces, or which are derived from Egypt and other quarters. Slaves however, though sometimes brought to the market, are now commonly sold privately, which is not unfrequently complained of as an evil, inasmuch as it facilitates the sale of such as have been stolen from other quarters. The people of Barabra and Kordofân cannot relinquish their favorite liquor, and as all who drink persist in drinking till they are completely inebriated, the natural violence of their temper is increased, and gives occasion to continual disputes, which frequently are not decided without blows, and occasionally terminate in bloodshed.