THE EGYPTIAN SUDAN

to undertake a desert journey of nearly 2,000 miles was absurd.

M. de Maillet, therefore, promptly excused himself from the

honour, but was careful to draw up a set of rules for the guidance

of the man who was to go in his stead through a country which

he himself had never seen. These rules were strictly observed by

the new envoy, with what result we shall presently see.

The choice of a successor for M. de Maillet fell upon the Vice-

Consul of Damietta, a young man of the name of Le Noir du RouLE ; he had some knowledge of the Arabic language, but he knew neither the ancient language of Abyssinia (Ethiopic) nor

the modern (Amharic), and he appears to have been ignorant of

the manners and customs of Orientals generally. According to

Bruce, he had a violent predilection for the dress, carriage, and manners of France, and a hearty contempt for those of all other

nations, and as he had not sufficient address to disguise his views,

his mission was fraught with danger from the beginning. He had no friends among the French colony in Cairo, but as he was

the nominee of M. de Maillet and of the Jesuits, and as they were

supported by the authority of Louis XIV., he troubled himself

little about this matter. When the Franciscans, into whose hands

the Ethiopian mission had been entrusted by the Pope, heard of

the new embassy, they were extremely angry, and they determined

to use every means in their power to turn du Roule's mission into

a fiasco. They succeeded in making the Coptic community

throughout Egypt take their view of the matter, and, before he

started, his mission was doomed to failure.

On July 9th, 1704, du Roule set out from Cairo, but his

followers were fewer than he had anticipated, for many of them

on getting an inkling of the true inwardness of affairs promptly

withdrew from the mission. At every place which he reached on

the Nile between Cairo and AsyOt he found that the minds of the

people had been poisoned against him, and that obstruction was

everywhere, in every shape and form. When he at length

arrived at AsyOt he saw that the chief of his caravan, one

Belak, a Moor, was only prevented by fear from declaring him-

self an open enemy, and that every man's hand was against him and his party. Subsequently it was discovered from the

confession of Ali Shalabi, the governor of Asy^t, that the

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