Wednesday, April 2.—This was to be a most momentous day of my travels; for I was to reach that place which was the first distinct object of our mission, and I was to come into contact with those people on whose ill or goodwill depended the whole success of our mission. Although encamped late at night, we were again up at an early hour; but in endeavouring to return to the track which we had left the preceding night, we inadvertently crossed it, and so came to another village, with a very numerous herd of cattle, where we became aware of our error, and then had to regain the main road. Two miles afterwards there was a very great change in the character of the country; for the sandy soil which had characterized the district all along the komádugu now gave way to clay, where water is only met with at a considerable depth. We met a troop of tugúrchi, who informed us that none of the villages along our track at the present moment had a supply of water, not even the considerable village Kangáruwa, but that at the never-failing well of Beshér I should be able to water my horse. This news only served to confirm me in my resolution to ride on in advance, in order as well to water my poor beast before the greatest heat of the day, as to reach the residence in good time.

I therefore took leave of my two young servants, and, giving Mohammed strict orders to follow me with the camels as fast as possible, I hastened on. The wooded level became now interrupted from time to time by bare naked concavities, or shallow hollows, consisting of black sedimentary soil, where, during the rainy season, the water collects and, drying up gradually, leaves a most fertile sediment for the cultivation of the másakwá. This is a peculiar kind of holcus (Holcus cernuus), which forms a very important article in the agriculture of Bórnu. Sown soon after the end of the rainy season, it grows up entirely by the fructifying power of the soil, and ripens with the assistance only of the abundant dews, which fall here usually in the months following the rainy season. These hollows, which are the most characteristic natural feature in the whole country, and which encompass the south-western corner of the great lagoon of Central Africa throughout a distance of more than sixty miles from its present shore, are called “ghadír” by the Arabs “fírki,” or “ánge,” by the Kanúri. Indeed they amply testify to the far greater extent of the lagoon in ante-historical times.

Pushing on through a country of this description, and passing several villages, I reached about noon Beshér, a group of villages scattered over the cornfields, where numerous horsemen of the sheikh were quartered; and being unable myself to find the well, I made a bargain with one of the people to water my horse, for which he exacted from me forty “kúngona” or cowries. However, when I had squatted down for a moment’s rest in the shade of a small talha-tree, his wife, who had been looking on, began to reprove him for driving so hard a bargain with a young inexperienced stranger; and then she brought me a little tiggra and curdled milk diluted with water, and afterwards some ngáji, or paste of sorghum.

Having thus recruited my strength, I continued my march; but my horse, not having fared so well, was nearly exhausted. The heat was intense; and therefore we proceeded but slowly till I reached Kálilwá, when I began seriously to reflect on my situation, which was very peculiar. I was now approaching the residence of the chief whom the mission, of which I had the honour to form part, was especially sent out to salute, in a very poor plight, without resources of any kind, and left entirely by myself owing to the death of the director. I was close to this place, a large town, and was about to enter it without a single companion. The heat being just at its highest, no living being was to be seen either in the village or on the road; and I hesitated a moment, considering whether it would not be better to wait here for my camels. But my timid reluctance being confounded by the thought that my people might be far behind, and that if I waited for them we should find no quarters prepared for us, I spurred on my nag, and soon reached the western suburb of Kúkawa.

Proceeding with some hesitation towards the white clay wall which encircles the town, and which from a little distance could scarcely be distinguished from the adjoining ground, I entered the gate, being gazed at by a number of people collected here, and who were still more surprised when I inquired for the residence of the sheikh. Then passing the little daily market (the dyrríya), which was crowded with people, I rode along the déndal, or promenade, straight up to the palace, which borders the promenade towards the east. It is flanked by a very indifferent mosque, built likewise of clay, with a tower at its north-west corner, while houses of grandees enclose the place on the north and south sides. The only ornament of this place is a fine chédia or caoutchouc-tree in front of the house of ʿAli Ladán, on the south side: but occasionally it becomes enlivened by interesting groups of Arabs and native courtiers in all the finery of their dress, and of their richly caparisoned horses.

The sheikh, though he usually resides in his palace in the eastern town, was at present here; and the slaves stared at me, without understanding or caring to understand, what I wanted, until Díggama, the storekeeper, was called, who, knowing something of me as ʿAbd el Kerím, ordered a slave to conduct me to the vizier. Though I had heard some account of the sheikh living out of the western town, I was rather taken by surprise at seeing the large extent of the double town; and I was equally astonished at the number of gorgeously dressed horsemen whom I met on my way.

Considering my circumstances, I could not have chosen a more favourable moment for arriving. About two hundred horsemen were assembled before the house of the vizier, who was just about to mount his horse in order to pay his daily visit to the sheikh. When he came out, he saluted me in a very cheerful way, and was highly delighted when he heard and saw that I had come quite alone. He told me he had known me already, from the letter which I had sent to his agent in Zínder stating that I would come after I had finished my business, but not before. While he himself rode in great state to the sheikh, he ordered one of his people to show me my quarters. These were closely adjoining the vizier’s house, consisting of two immense courtyards, the more secluded of which enclosed, besides a half-finished clay dwelling, a very spacious and neatly built hut. This, as I was told, had been expressly prepared for the mission before it was known that we were without means.

I had scarcely taken possession of my quarters when I received several visits from various parties attached to the mission, who all at once made me quite au fait of all the circumstances of my not very enviable situation as one of its surviving members. The first person who called upon me was Ibrahím, the carpenter, who, at Mr. Richardson’s request, had been sent up from Tripoli, at the monthly salary of twenty mahbúbs besides a sum of four dollars for his maintenance. He was certainly a handsome young man, about twenty-two years of age, a native of “the holy house” (Bét el mogaddus) or Jerusalem, with big sounding phrases in his mouth, and quite satisfied to return with me directly to Fezzán without having done anything. Then came his more experienced and cheerful companion, ʿAbd eʾ Rahmán, a real sailor, who was not so loud in his clamours, but urged more distinctly the payment of his salary, which was equal to that of Ibrahím.

After I had consoled these dear friends, and assured them that I had no idea at present of returning northward, and that I should do my best to find the means of satisfying the most urgent of their claims, there arrived another of the bloodsuckers of the mission, and the most thirsty of them all. It was my colleague, the bibulous Yusuf, son of Mukni the former governor of Fezzán, accompanied by Mohammed ben Bu-Sʿad, whom Mr. Richardson, when he discharged Yusuf in Zínder, had taken into his service in his stead, and by Mohammed ben Habíb, the least serviceable of Mr. Richardson’s former servants. Yusuf was mounted upon a fine horse, and most splendidly dressed; but he was extremely gracious and condescending, as he entertained the hope that my boxes and bags, which had just arrived with my faithful Gatróni, were full of shells, and that I should be able to pay his salary at once. He was greatly puzzled when I informed him of my extreme poverty. Mr. Richardson’s other servants, to my great regret, had gone off the day before, unpaid as they were, in order to regain their various homes.

I now ascertained that the pay due to Mr. Richardson’s servants amounted to more than three hundred dollars; besides which there was the indefinite debt to the Sfáksi, amounting in reality to twelve hundred and seventy dollars, but which, by the form in which the bill had been given, might easily be doubled. I did not possess a single dollar, a single bernús, nor anything of value, and moreover was informed by my friends that I should be expected to make both to the sheikh and to the vizier a handsome present of my own. I now saw also that what the Sheríf el Habíb had told me on the road (viz. that all Mr. Richardson’s things had been divided and squandered) was not altogether untrue. At least, they had been deposited with the vizier on very uncertain conditions, or rather had been delivered up to him by the two interpreters of our late companion, intimating to him that I and Mr. Overweg were quite subordinate people attached to the mission, and that we had no right to interfere in the matter.

Seeing how matters stood, I thought it best, in order to put a stop to the intrigues which had been set a going, to take Mohammed ben Sʿad into my service on the same salary which he had received from Mr. Richardson. Besides, I pledged my word to all that they should each receive what was due to him, only regretting that the rest of Mr. Richardson’s people had already gone away. After all these communications, fraught with oppressive anxiety, I received a most splendid supper as well from the sheikh as from the vizier, and, after the various exertions of the day, enjoyed a quiet night’s rest in my clean cottage.

Thus strengthened, I went the next morning to pay my respects to the vizier, taking with me a small present of my own, the principal attractions of which lay in a thick twisted lace of silk of very handsome workmanship, which I had had made in Tripoli, and a leathern letter-case of red colour, which I had brought with me from Europe. Destitute as I was of any means, and not quite sure as yet whether Her Britannic Majesty’s Government would authorize me to carry out the objects of the mission, I did not deem it expedient to assume too much importance, but simply told the vizier that, though the director of the mission had not been fortunate enough to convey to him and the sheikh with his own mouth the sentiments of the British Government, yet I hoped that, even in this respect, these endeavours would not be quite in vain, although at the present moment our means were so exhausted that, even for executing our scientific plans, we were entirely dependent on their kindness.

The same reserve I maintained in my interview with the sheikh on the morning of Friday, when I laid little stress upon the object of our mission (to obtain security of commerce for English merchants), thinking it better to leave this to time, but otherwise dwelling upon the friendship established between the sheikh’s father and the English, and representing to them that, relying upon this manifestation of their friendly disposition, we had come without reserve to live awhile among them, and under their protection and with their assistance to obtain an insight into this part of the world, which appeared so strange in our eyes. Our conversation was quite free from constraint or reserve, as nobody was present besides the sheikh and the vizier.

I found the sheikh (ʿOmár, the eldest son of Mohammed el Amín el Kánemy) a very simple, benevolent, and even cheerful man. He has regular and agreeable features, rather a little too round to be expressive; but he is remarkably black—a real glossy black, such as is rarely seen in Bórnu, and which he has inherited undoubtedly from his mother, a Bagírmaye princess. He was very simply dressed in a light tobe, having a bernús negligently wrapped round his shoulder; round his head a dark-red shawl was twisted with great care; and his face was quite uncovered, which surprised me not a little, as his father used to cover it in the Tuarek fashion. He was reclining upon a divan covered with a carpet, at the back of a fine airy hall neatly polished.

My presents were very small, the only valuable article among them being a nice little copy of the Kurán, which on a former occasion I had bought in Egypt for five pounds sterling, and was now carrying with me for my own use. That I made a present of this book to the prince may perhaps be regarded with an unfavourable eye by some persons in this country; but let them consider it as a sign of an unprejudiced mind, and of the very high esteem in which he held me, that, although knowing me to be a Christian, he did not refuse to accept from my hands that which was most holy in his eyes. On the whole I could not have expected a more friendly reception, either from the sheikh or from his vizier. But there was a very delicate point which I was obliged to touch upon: what was to become of Mr. Richardson’s property?

In the afternoon I went again to the vizier, and requested to see the inventory of all that my late companion had left; and he showed it to me and read it himself. He then ordered the box to be opened, which contained clothes and papers; and I was glad to see that not only the journals, upon the keeping of which Mr. Richardson had bestowed great care, but also all his other collectanea, were safe. Having taken the inventory with me, I sent Mohammed the following day to him with the request that Mr. Richardson’s property should be delivered to me. Having been desired to call myself at noon, I went, but was surprised to find only Lamíno (properly el Amín), the vizier’s confidential officer, of whom I shall have occasion to speak hereafter. I was still more surprised when only some of Mr. Richardson’s boxes were brought in, and I was desired to select what I wanted, and leave the rest behind. This I refused to do, and asked where the other things were, when Lamíno did not hesitate to declare that the ornamented gun and the handsome pair of pistols had been sold. Upon hearing this, though I had been treated very kindly and hospitably on my arrival, and had received immense quantities of provision of every kind, I could not refrain from declaring that if in truth they had behaved so unscrupulously with other people’s property I had nothing more to do here, and returned to my quarters immediately.

My firmness had its desired effect; and late in the evening I received a message from the vizier, that if I wanted to have a private interview with him I might come now, as during the daytime he was always troubled by the presence of a great many people. The person who brought me this message was Háj Edrís, a man of whom in the course of my proceedings I shall have to speak repeatedly. Satisfied with having an opportunity of conversing with the vizier without reserve, I followed the messenger immediately, and found Háj Beshír quite alone, sitting in an inner court of his house, with two small wax candles by his side. We then had a long interview, which lasted till midnight, and the result of which was that I protested formally against the sale of those things left by Mr. Richardson, and insisted that all should be delivered to me and to Mr. Overweg as soon as he should arrive, when we would present to the sheikh and to the vizier, in a formal manner all those articles which we knew our companion had intended to give to them. Besides, I urged once more the necessity of forwarding the news of Mr. Richardson’s death, and of my safe arrival as soon as possible, as, after our late misfortunes in Aír, Her Britannic Majesty’s Government, as well as our friends, would be most anxious about our safety. I likewise tried to persuade my benevolent and intelligent host that he might do a great service to the mission, if he would enable us to carry out part of our scientific purposes without delay, as Government would certainly not fail to honour us with their confidence, if they saw that we were going on. Having carried all my points, and being promised protection and assistance to the widest extent, I indulged in a more friendly chat, and, delighted by the social character of my host, and full of the most confident hopes for my future proceedings, withdrew a little after midnight.

Having in this way vindicated the honourable character of the mission, and my own, I applied myself with more cheerfulness to my studies and inquiries, for which I found ample opportunity; for many distinguished personages from distant countries were staying here at this time, partly on their journey to or from Mekka, partly only attracted by the fame of the vizier’s hospitable and bounteous character. But before I give any account of my stay in Kúkawa previous to my setting out for Ádamáwa, I think it well to try to impart to the reader a more lively interest in the country to which he has thus been transferred, by laying before him a short account of its history, as I have been able to make it out from original documents and from oral information.