Boo-Khaloom, who had suffered very considerably from fever, cold, and ague, now became so seriously ill, that our departure was of necessity postponed, and he insisted upon my prescribing for him, saying, “ he was quite sure that I could cure him, if it was the will of God that he should l i v e i f not, that nobody could.” His confidence in me gave me some confidence in myself: but alone, with very few medicines, and less skill, my situation was really one of great anxiety; for no one could foresee what might have been the consequence, had any thing serious happened to him while under my hands. He became alarmingly ill, and for two days and nights I had great doubts of his recovery ; to my great satisfaction, however, on the third morning, after a night of pain and delirium (and which I had passed in watching by his side), a violent eruption appeared on his skin, with some little moisture, produced by covering him up the whole day with blankets, and suffering no one to come into the room but his favourite female slave. By the evening, he became much better. Hajamad, or charms, are what the Arabs have most faith in, when they are ill. All the fighis (writers) and maraboots in Sockna were employed on this occasion by my friend’s friends, and one night the tassels of his cap were literally loaded with them. He assured me, when alone, that he had no faith in such things, and smiled when he said his friends would think ill of him, were he to refuse; his faith, however, was stronger than he chose to acknowledge, and entering, unexpectedly, one morning, I found him with a dove that had been just killed and cut open lying on his head, which, as he assured me, was because a very great maraboot had come from Wadan on purpose to perform the operation. During our stay at Sockna, the marriage of the son of one of the richest inhabitants, Hadgi Mohammed-el-Hair-Trigge, was celebrated in the true Arab style. There is something so rudely chivalric in their ceremonies (so very superior to the dull monotony of a Tripolitan wedding), where from one to five hundred guests, all males, assemble, covered with gold lace, and look at one another, from the evening of one day until daylight the next, that I cannot help describing them. The morning of the marriage-day (for the ceremony is always performed in the evening, that is, the final ceremony ; for they are generally betrothed, and the fatah read, a year before) is ushered in by the music of the town or tribe, consisting of a bagpipe and two small drums, serenading the bride first,
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