requested he would commence making a sort of litter, to go between two camels, or mules, such as he had heard were used by the sultans of Fezzan : our carpenter very frankly said, that any thing he could do should be done with pleasure, but he could not work in the sun, and that a shed must be built for him, and wood must be found for him, as he had seen none in the country that would make the keel of a jolly-boat. As much as was necessary of this reply was interpreted to the sheikh, who promised him that negroes should make mats directly for his shed, and that others should go into the wood and bring the largest trees they could find; and in the evening a present came for the carpenter of wheat, rice, honey, and butter. March 6.—The sheikh sent this morning to say, that he wished for some of our rockets, in order that the Shouaas, his enemies, might see what the English had‘brought him. On Monday, the day of the fsug or market, when they would be in the town, we promised him six; but reminded him, at the same time, that we had but few, and that here we could make no more. He also sent a very fine young lion, about three months old, not above half the size of that I had seen before: this was a very tame good-natured fellow, and I could not help regretting the necessity we were under of refusing him a corner of our huts, as he was ordered to be immediately killed in consequence of our declining to accept him. March 7.—Doctor Oudney’s illness increased, and he had daily fits of the ague, which, in his weak state, became alarming. I had made it my business, as I thought it my duty, to cultivate the friendship and good-will of Boo-Khaloom, and by his means I hoped to be made acquainted with the sheikh’s real intentions towards us. The man of Loggun, who had returned from Senaar, I used every means to got a sight of, but I found it impossible, and he sent me word privately that he dared not come. March 8 and 9 — Both these days the numbers of persons who crowded my hut, from morning to night, were greater, and consequently their visits more pestering than common. Every little thing, from the compass to the pen and ink, from the watch to the tin cup out of which I drank, excited their curiosity ; and as they now became bolder, they- seized hold of every thing which they formerly only eyed at a distance. I t was not, however, their curiosity alone that was excited—the possession was coveted, either for themselves or the sheikh, of every article: a looking-glass, and a small lantern, I rescued out of the hands of at least a dozen, a dozen times. A copy of Captain Lyon’s book, the fame of which had preceded us, in consequence of Doctor Oudney’s having shown it to some merchants at Mourzuk, was demanded twenty times a day, and it required all my patience to go over and explain the pictures as often as they required. I t produced very different effects, but in all astonishment and in most suspicion. The sheikh had heard of it, and one of his slaves borrowed it for him of my servant, by stealth, as he did not wish it to be known that he had a desire to see it. For three days after this I was again and again applied to by all his chief people to see what I had drawn, or written, as they express it, of Bornou. I repeatedly assured them, that those in the book were not mine, that the person who wrote them was far away. I t would not do ; they shook their heads, and said I was cunning, and would not show them. They then changed their tone, and very seriously begged that I would not write them, that is, draw their portraits ; that they did not like it, that the sheikh did not like it, that it was a sin ; and I am quite sure, from the impression, that we had much better never have produced the book at all. The sheikh expressed a wish that two rockets might be started, on a signal being made from the top of his house. I gave Ka- rowash a blue light, with instructions how to make the signal : his heart, however, failed him when he got to the spot, and the signal was made by a wisp of straw. The first rocket went off nearly m 2
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