Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 4.djvu/437

 who could not there protect us; therefore we were to trust to ourselves, and admit of no parley; for if we passed, we should pass with applause, as if the king's force had concluded us; and if we miscarried, the blame would be laid upon ourselves, as having ventured, so thinly attended, through a country laid waste by rebel Arabs, expressly in defiance of government. He added, that he did not believe it was in Shekh Fidele's power, from want of time, to do us any injury upon the roads; that the people in Teawa were in general well-affected to us, and afraid we should bring Yasine and the Daveina upon them, and so were the Jehaina; and as for the pack of graceless soldiers that were then about the Shekh, their belief that we had really no money with us, and the last exhibition I had shewn them on horse-back, had perfectly cured them of venturing their lives for little, against people so much superior to them in the management of arms; yet he wished us to be active and vigilant like men, and trust in nothing till we had seen the Shekh of Beyla, and not to lose a moment on the road.

Our journey, for the first seven hours, was through a barren, bare, and sandy plain, without finding a vestige of any living creature, without water, and without grass, a country that seemed under the immediate curse of Heaven. At twelve o'clock at night we turned a little to the eastward of south, to enter through very broken ground into a narrow defile, between two hills of no considerable height. This pass is called Mattina. One of our camel-drivers declared that he saw two men run into the bushes before him, upon which our people took all to their slings, throwing many stones before them into the bushes, directed nearly to a man's height. At their earnest desire I ordered Ismael to