The taste of the baxk is considered very wholesome,
and a corrective to bad and fetid water. Besides possessing
this quality, the mobur is useful as a poultice
when mashed and mixed with water; and the Somali
always have recourse to it when badly wounded.
During my peregrinations at this place, I often
dropped bits of paper about the jungle, little suspecting
what would become of them; and, to my surprise,
one day the interpreter came to me in some alarm to
say that several Dulbahantas had arrived at Bunder
Gori, and were sharply canvassing amongst themselves
the probable obj ects of my visit. I could not be travelling
without a purpose, at so much expense; and they
thought these bits of paper, which they had carefully
picked up, conclusive evidence I was marking out some
spots for future purposes. They abused the Warsin-
gali ^or being such fools as to let me travel in their
country, and said I should never cross over to them.
This little incident of dropping paper, though fully
explained to them, was ever afterwards brought up in
accusation against me, and proved very perplexing.
30th.— Camp Habal IshawaU. Altitude 5052 feet.
We were now all together, and I thought ready to
march; but the men had first to be paid their hire in
advance—a monthly stipend of five tobes each. When
that was settled, many other men, and amongst them
the sultan’s second brother Hassan, coveting my clothes,
wished to be engaged. Some tedious hours were wasted
on this subject. The sultan, at the instigation of these
advocates for service, would have it, if I wished to
travel according to the custom of the country, I must
take more men with me as a guard. I, on the other
hand, neither wanted them nor could afford to pay
them, as I had been so extensively plundered but
wished to exchange Sumunter for his brother, and promised
high rewards if he would take me through the
journey. To put an end to the discussion, I struck
my tent, never to be pitched again, and waited patiently
until the camels came. I t was not until near sundown
that the camels were ready and the march commenced.
The sultan then ordered Hassan and the naughty boy
Abdullah, against my wish, to accompany me on the
journey; and we set off, leaving two or three loads
behind to be brought up on the morrow. The march
was a short one, made to relieve the one beyond; for
the spring of water we were now drinking from was
the last on this side the range, I t led us up a gradual
but tortuous ascent, very thickly clad with strong
bushes, to a kraal or ring-fence of prickly acacias,
which was evidently made to protect the Somali’s sheep
from lions, leopards, hyenas, and freebooters suddenly
pouncing on them.
We remained here three days, sending the things
I had brought in relays across the mountain, and
fetching up the rear ones. The sultan could not lose
the opportunity afforded by my detention to come again
and beg for presents, and I gave him a razor to shave
his head with and make a clean Mussulman of him.