as the grand accumulated akkabaah proceeds from the latter place. In going from Akka to Tagassa* they employ sixteen days, here sojourning fifteen days more to replenish their camels; they then proceed to the Oasis and W e ll o f Taudeny, which they reach in seven days ; here again they remain fifteen days; their next route is to Arawan, another watering place, which the y reach in seven days ; here they sojourn fifteen days ; and then proceed and reach Timbuctoo the sixth d a y , making a jou rn e y o f fifty-four days actual travelling, and o f seventy-five days repose, being altogether, from Fas to 'l'imbuctoo, one hundred and twenty-nine days, or four lunar months and nine days.-f- There is another akkabaah which sets out from Wedinoon and Sok Assa, and traversing the Desert between the black mountains o f Gape Bojador and Gualata, touches at Tagassa, E l Garbie (both g ’s guttural, being the letter £■), or West Tagassa, and staying there to collect salt, proceeds to Timbuctoo. T h e time occupied by this akkabaah is five or six months, as it goes as far as Jibbel-el-bied, or the White Mountains, near Cape Blanco, through the desert ofMogralfra and Woled Abbusebah, to a place called Agadeen.J where it sojourns twenty days. T h e akkabaahs which cross the Desert may be compared to our fleets o f merchant vessels under convoy, the (stata) convoy o f the Desert being two or more Arabs, belonging to the tribe * A person pronouncing this word in Africa, unless he knows the power and force of the letter ¿, and how to pronounce that difficult guttural, would be una ble to make himself intelligible. t Some akkabaahs perform the journey in less, I myself having, when I had a commercial establishment at Agadeer, received a caravan of gum Soudan from Timbuctoo in eighty-two days. £ Arguin in the maps. through whose territory the caravan passes; thus, in passing t e territory o f Woled Abbusebah, they are accompanied b y two Sebayhées, or people o f that country, who on reaching the confines o f the territory o f Woled Delim, receive a remuneration, and return, delivering them to the protection o f two chiefs o f Woled Deleim ; these again conducting them to the confines o f the territory o f the Mograffra Arabs, to whose care they d e live r them, and so on, till they reach T im b u c to o : any assault made against the akkabaah during this journey, is considered as an in sult to the whole clan to which the (stata) con voy belongs, and for which they never fail to seek ample revenge. Besides these grand accumulated caravans, there are others which cross the Desert, on any emergency, without a stata or guard o f soldiers: but this is a perilous expedition, and the y are too often plundered near the northern confines o f the Desert, b y two notorious tribes, called Dikna and Em jo t* These fero- cious hordes are most cruel and sanguinary, poor and miserable, ignorant o f their situation, but unsubdued and free ; when they attack the akkabaahs they generally succeed; sometimes they put all the persons to death, except those whom they cannot pursue. In the year 1798, an akkabaah consisting o f two thousand camels loaded with Soudanic produce, together with seven hundred slaves, was plundered and dispersed, and many were killed. These desperate attacks are conducted in the following manner : a whole clan picket their herses at the entrance o f their tents, and send out scouts to giv e notice when an akkabaah is lik e ly to pass; these being mounted on the * There is an emigration from this tribe of one hundred families, now residing in several encampments near the city of Marocco.
27f 39
To see the actual publication please follow the link above