Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 1.djvu/62

ivlx ly came into my mind, that by the gibberish, in imitation of Turkish, which the Arab had uttered to me while he was beating and stripping me, he took me for a Turk, and to this in all probability the ill-usage was owing.

old man and a number of young Arabs came up to me where I was sitting. I gave them the salute Salam Alicum! which was only returned by one young man, in a tone as if he wondered at my impudence. The old man then asked me, Whether I was a Turk, and what I had to do there? I replied, I was no Turk, but a poor Christian physician, a Dervish that went about the world seeking to do good for God's sake, was then flying from famine, and going to Greece to get bread. He then asked me if I was a Cretan? I said, I had never been in Crete, but came from Tunis, and was returning to that town, having lost every thing I had in the shipwreck of that vessel. I said this in so despairing a tone, that there was no doubt left with the Arab that the fact was true. A ragged, dirty baracan was immediately thrown over me, and I was ordered up to a tent, in the end of which stood a long spear thrust through it, a mark of sovereignty.

saw the Shekh of the tribe, who being in peace with the Bey of Bengazi, and also with the Shekh of Ptolometa, after many questions ordered me a plentiful supper, of which all my servants partook, none of them having perished. A multitude of consultations followed on their complaints, of which I freed myself in the best manner I could, alledging the loss of all my medicines, in order to induce some of them to seek for the sextant at least, but all to no 1