Page:A Prisoner of the Khaleefa.djvu/229

Rh their lives. Wohatt was given the chapel of the Mission as a house to live in; I was given one of the priest's rooms opposite the arches. Windows, doors, every scrap of wood, metal, and ornaments had been taken from the place; it was almost a complete ruin, but the garden had been kept in excellent condition, its produce — dates, figs, oranges, limes, and vegetables — being sold on account of the Beit-el-Mal. Wohatt, when arranging his sleeping quarters, found the altar in his way, and made two or three ineffectual attempts to pull it down; failing, he utilized it as a resting-place for household rubbish, and here cocks crowed and hens hatched out their broods.

When we came to construct saturation tanks, it was proposed to take the material from the walls of the Mission, but I told Hamad'na Allah and Wohatt that as we had to live in the place, it would be far better to repair than further demolish; so the necessary materials were brought from outside by the fifty to sixty slaves sent over to assist us in making the tanks and carrying the earth from the mounds, While the construction of the tanks proceeded, we had to extract saltpetre in the boilers, etc., sent to us at Halfeyeh, and which had been brought with us; we produced maybe four to five pounds per diem on an average during a period of six months — the time we were occupied in building the tanks. Perdikaki made some gunpowder with our first consignment; it was a failure. The good fellow, though, mixed it with some powder from the old Government stock, and sent us another warning. My chief, Abdel Wohatt, was the