derers, whose country he scarcely knew the name of before our arrival, surpassed all we could have expected. Knowing us through the medium of the bashaw of Tripoli only, his disinterested conduct could have been alone the dictation of a generous confidence; and his own penetration and sagacity had long since convinced him of the perfect innocence of our intentions in visiting his country, notwithstanding the injurious reports to the contrary, which had been communicated to his subjects, through the ill will or ignorance of some of the Fezzan merchants: he had sent me apparel from his own house on hearing the news of my forlorn state, after escaping out of the hands of the Felatahs, and had astonished the people about him by his exclamations of sorrow on the first report reaching him of my death. Kaffir as they thought me, he mentioned' my escape in his letter to Barca Gana—which met us on our return—as a proof of the protection of God’s providence, in a manner which made a visible alteration in the conduct, not only of the chief, but of the whole army, towards m e ; and every part of his conduct tended to convince us, that his protection and confidence proceeded more from the opinions he had formed of the grandeur and generosity of the English nation (and, we were willing to flatter ourselves, from his approbation of our conduct), than from any hope of repayment or remuneration from his ally the bashaw. The constant sickness of Doctor Oudney, who, nearly ever since our return from Munga, had been confined to his h u t;—Hillman’s frequent attacks of ague and delirium, and the uncertainty as to the manner in which any supplies were to be obtained, to enable us either to proceed or return, tended but little to keep up our spirits; —my eyes had for some months been too weak to allow of my reading in the evening, or, indeed, of bearing the light in the hut for any length of time together; and we separated, from a mutual repugnance to conversation, from the dreariness of our prospects, almost immediately after our evening meal. We had frequent and violent showers of rain, with thunder, and most vivid lightning; the waters covered the face of the country in extensive lakes, and our excursions in search of game were now confined to the immediate neighbourhood of our residence. The gus- sub had increased in height greatly; and, at this season of the year, there are other reasons besides the falls of rain which induce people to remain in their habitations—when the great lake overflows the immense district which, in the dry season, affords cover and food by its coarse grass and jungle to the numerous savage animals with which Bornou abounds, they are driven from these wilds, and take refuge in the standing corn, and sometimes in the immediate neighbourhood of the towns. Elephants had already been seen at Dow- ergoo, scarcely six miles from Kouka; and a female slave, while she was returning home from weeding the corn to Kowa, not more than ten miles distant, had been carried off by a lioness: the hymnas, which are every where in legions, grew now so extremely ravenous, that a good large village, where I sometimes procured a draught of sour milk on my duck-shooting excursions, had been attacked the night before my last visit, the town absolutely carried by storm, notwithstanding defences nearly six feet high of branches of the prickly tulloh, and two donkies, whose flesh these animals are particularly fond of, carried off in spite of the efforts of the people. We constantly heard them close to the walls of our own town at nights, and on a gate being left partly open, they would enter, and carry off any unfortunate animal that they could find in the streets. There are a particular class of female slaves here, to whom the duty of watching and labouring in the fields of grain is always allotted. I have before said, that all laborious work is performed by that sex we consider as the weakest, and whom we employ in the more domestic duties only—and it is to them this perilous work is assigned. The female slaves from Musgow, a description of whom I have somewhere else given, are never bought by the Tripoli or b b 2
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