T he Daveina being Arabs, who conftantly live in tents,
bear a mortal enmity to all who inhabit villages, and, as
occafion offered, had deftroyed, ftarved, and laid walle the
greateft part o f Atbara. They had been outlawed by the
government o f Sennaar for having joined Yafous II. upon
the expedition againft that kingdom. They had ever fince
been well-received by. the Abyflinians, lived independent,
and in perpetual defiance o f the government o f Sennaar.
The y had often threatened Teawa, but had g iven the.Shekh
o f Bey la an affurance o f .friendfhip over fince Yafine had
married a daughter o f that Shekh.
T he ftrength o f Teawa was about ay horfe, of w hich
about ten were armed with coats o f mail. They had about a
dozen o f firelocks, very contemptible from the order in which
th e y were kept, and ftill more fo from the hands that bore
them. The reft o f the inhabitants might amount to twelve
hundred men, naked, miferable, and deipicable Arabs, like
the reft o f thoie that live in villages, w h o are much inferior
in courage to the Arabs that dwell in tents ; weak as,
its ftate was, iu was the feat o f government, and as fuch- a
■certain degree o f reverence attended-it. Fidel«, the Shekh
o f Atbara, was reputed by his own people a man o f courage ;
this had been doubted at Sennaar. Welled Haffan,'his father,
had been employed by Nailer the fon, late k in g o f Sennaar,
in the murder o f his father and fovereign Baady, which
b e had perpetrated, as I have already mentioned. Such was
the ftate o f Teawa. Its eonfequence was only to remain
-till the Daveina ihouid refolve to attack it, when its cornfields
being burnt and deftroyed in a night by a multitude
o f horfemen, the bones o f its inhabitants fcattered upon
4 the
the earth, would .be all its remains, like thofe o f the mi-
ferable villa ge o f Garigana.
I h a v e already obferved,'in the beginning o f the journey,
that the Shekh o f the Arabs Nile, who refided m Abyflinia
near Ras el Feel, fince the expedition o f Yafous, had warned
me, at Hor-Cacamoot, to, diftruft the’ fair promifes and
friendly profeflionsI o f Shekh Fidele,. and had, indeed,
raifedfuch doubts in my mipd, that, had not the Daveina
been parted from Sim Sim, (or the confines o f Abyflinia)
though there would have been a .rifle, that if, coming wit
that tribe, I ihouid haye been-ill received at Sennaar, I never-
thelefs would have travelled with them, rather than y
Teawa ; but the Daveina were gone.
T h e Shekh o f Atbara, having no apparent intereft to
deceive us, had hitherto been a friend as far as words would
go and had promifed every thing that remained in his power;
but for fear o f the worft, Nile had given us -a confidential
man, who was related to the Jehaina and to the principal
Shekh o f that tribe. This man conduced an afs, loaded with
fait among the other Arabs o f the caravan,and was to fet o
to Ras el Feel upon the firft appearance o f danger, which he
was to learn by coming once in two days, or oftner, either
. to Teawa, where, he was no farther known than as being
one o f the Jehaina, or to the river, where my Soliman was
to meet him at the pools o f w a te r ; but his fecret was only
known to Soliman, myfelf, and a Greek fervant, Michael.
From leaving Hor-Cacamoot, he had no perfonal interview
with m e ; but the night, when we were like to penih for
thirft in the wood, he had fent me, by Soliman, pnvately,
a horn-full o f water, which he had in his goat’s ikin, and
V o l . IV. Y y • f o r