CHAPTER XIV.

Remarks on the appearance of the country in passing up the Nile.Condition of a Christian at Cairo.--Interview with the Aga. - Miscellaneous observations on the customs of the Arabs, and other races of people found in Cairo.-Information respecting the interior of Africa.— Visit to the caravans and slave markets.-The traveller's reflections on his condition and prospects.-His last letter to Mr. Jefferson.-Joins a caravan, and prepares to depart for Sennaar.-He is taken suddenly ill. His death.-Account of his person and character.

As he was furnished with letters of recommendation to the British Consul at Cairo, he found little difficulty in procuring such accommodations as he desired, and such information as enabled him to direct his attention immediately to the great object of his mission. His intention was to join a caravan, bound to the interior, and to continue with it to the end of its route. Beyond this he must be guided by circumstances, which could not be foreseen, and concerning which no calculation was to be made. He adopted a dress suited to the character he was to assume, and began in earnest to study the manners of the people around him, and particularly of the traders in the caravans, which were then at Cairo. Three months were passed in this occupation. He kept a journal of

whatever he deemed most worthy of record, which was afterwards transmitted to the African Association. Such parts of the journal, as are contained in the proceedings of that body, will here be added. They bear the peculiar marks of the author's mind, his habits of observation, his boldness of thought and opinion, and his quick perception of resemblance aud contrast in the various races of men.

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August 14th.-I left Alexandria at midnight, with a pleasant breeze north; and was, at sunrise next morning, at the mouth of the Nile, which has a bar of sand across it, and soundings as irregular as the sea, which is raised upon it by the contentions of counter currents and winds.

"The view in sailing up the Nile is very confined, unless from the top of the mast, or some other eminence, and then it is an unbounded plain of excellent land, miserably cultivated, and yet interspersed with a great number of villages, both on its banks, and as far along the meadows as one can see in any direction. The river is also filled with boats passing and repassing-boats all of one kind, and navigated in one manner; nearly also of one size, the largest carrying ten or fifteen tons. On board of these boats are seen onions, water-melons,

dates, sometimes a horse, a camel (which lies down in the boat), sheep, goats, dogs, men, and women. Towards evening and morning they have music.

Whenever we stopped at a village, I used to walk into it with my conductor, who, being a Musselman, and a descendant from Mahomet, wore a green turban, and was therefore respected, and I was sure of safety; but, in truth, dressed as I was in a common Turkish habit, I believe I should have walked as safely without him. I saw no propensity among the inhabitants to incivility. The villages are most miserable assemblages of poor little mud huts, flung very close together without any kind of order, full of dust, lice, fleas, bugs, flies, and all the curses of Moses; people poorly clad, the youths naked; in such respects, they rank infinitely below any savages I ever saw.

"The common people wear nothing but a shirt and drawers, and they are always blue. Green is the royal, or holy colour; none but the descendants of Mahomet, if I am rightly informed, being permitted to wear it.

August 19th.-From the little town where we landed, the distance to Cairo is about a mile and a half, which we rode on asses; for the ass in this country is the Christian's horse,

as he is allowed no other animal to ride upon. Indeed I find the situation of a Christian, or, what they more commonly call here, a Frank, to be very, very humiliating, ignominious, and distressing. No one, by a combination of any causes, can reason down to such effects as experience teaches us do exist here; it being impossible to conceive, that the enmity I have alluded to could exist between men; or, in fact, that the same species of beings, from any causes whatever, should ever think and act so differently as the Egyptians and the English do.

"I arrived at Cairo early in the morning, on the nineteenth of August, and went to the house of the Venetian Consul, Mr. Rosetti, chargé d'affaires for the English Consul here. After dinner, not being able to find any other lodging, and receiving no very pressing invitation from Mr. Rosetti, to lodge with him, I went to a convent. This convent consists of missionaries, sent by the Pope to propagate the Christian faith, or at least to give shelter to Christians. The Christians here are principally from Damascus; the convent is governed by the order of Recollets; a number of English, as well as other European travellers, have lodged there.

"August 26th.-This day I was introduced

by Rosetti to the Aga Mahommed, the confidential minister of Ismael, the most powerful of the four ruling Beys. He gave me his hand to kiss, and with it the promise of letters, protection, and support, through Turkish Nubia, and also to some chiefs far inland. In a subsequent conversation, he told me I should see in my travels a people, who had power to transmute themselves into the forms of different animals. He asked me what I thought of the affair. I did not like to render the ignorance, simplicity, and credulity of the Turk apparent. I told him, that it formed a part of the character of all savages to be great necromancers; but that I had never before heard of any so great, as those which he had done me the honour to describe; that it had rendered me more anxious to be on my voyage, and if I passed among them, I would, in the letter I promised to write to him, give him a more particular account of them, than he had hitherto had. He asked me how I could travel, without the language of the people where I should pass? I told him, with vocabularies. I might as well have read to him a page of Newton's Principia. He returned to his fables again. Is it not curious, that the Egyptians (for I speak of the natives of the country, as well as of him, when