Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 1.djvu/360

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Grand Signior, and the Sherriffe of Mecca, the sovereigns of the two parties; and, the only thing the poor animal was interested in, he had threatened to destroy the wheat that was going to Mecca. After having spent great part of the afternoon in upbraiding the camel, whose measure of iniquity, it seems, was near full, each man thrust him through with a lance, devoting him Diis manibus & Diris, by a kind of prayer, and with a thousand curses upon his head. After which, every man retired, fully satisfied as to the wrongs he had received from the camel.

reader will easily observe in this, some traces of the *, or scape-goat of the Jews, which was turned out into the wilderness, loaded with the sins of the people.

morning I went to the palace, as we call it, in which were some very handsome apartments. There was a guard of janissaries at the door, who, being warriors, lately come from the bloody battle with the camel, did not fail to shew marks of insolence, which they wished to be mistaken for courage.

two Agas were sitting on a high bench upon Persian carpets; and about forty well-dressed and well-looking men, (many of them old) sitting on carpets upon the floor, in a semi-circle round them. They behaved with great politeness and attention, and asked no questions but general ones; as, How the sea agreed with me? If there was plenty at Cairo?


 * Levit. chap. xvi, ver. 5.