204 A TROPICAL DEPENDENCY have had schools in which they gave courses of lectures, attended by students, who afterwards received diplomas from the hands of their masters. In the biographical sketches of Ahmed Baba, the master from whom diplomas were received is mentioned as regularly as the school or university in which a man receives his education is mentioned in similar English works. A sketch which Ahmed Baba gives of one of the principal professors under whom he himself had studied, may serve to indicate the type of sage who was revered by the youth of Timbuctoo, and incidentally presents a picture of local scholastic life.

Mohammed Abou Bekr of Wankore, his pupil tells us, writing himself as an old man forty or fifty years later, was "one of the best of God's virtuous creatures. He was a working scholar, and a man instinct with goodness.

His nature was as pure as it was upright. He was himself so strongly impelled towards virtue, and had so high an opinion of others, that he always considered them as being so to speak his equals, and as having no knowledge of evil. He did not believe in the bad faith of the world, but always thought well of his fellow-creatures until they had committed a fault, and even after they had committed a fault. Calm and dignified, with a natural distinction and a modesty that rendered intercourse with him easy, he captured all hearts. Every one who knew him loved him." He taught during the whole of a long life, while at the same time he continued to take an active interest, and even some part, in public affairs. The Sultan, who shared the general respect for him, offered him the lucrative appointment of Governor of the Palace, but he refused it — "God having," he said, "delivered him from such cares." He was also offered the appointment of principal preacher to the great mosque, but that also he prayed the Sultan to excuse him from accepting. He was apparently wealthy, and possessed a fine library.

"His whole life was given," says Ahmed Baba, "to the service of others. He taught his pupils to love