" 4 —

welcome and came to terms with him. Among

these chiefs was my father Rahmat and his

brother El Fil who respected the treaty until the

day of their death, and we too have followed in

their footsteps in loyal obedience up to the present

time.

I was born on the Island of Wawissi

on the seventeenth of Moharram 1246, that is

1 83 1 of the Christian era, * and I grew up under

the eye of my father until my seventh birthday,

when he sent me to the Khartoum school. Here

I learned to read and to write, and was instructed in

the Koran as interpreted by Ali Omar and El Basri.

I was also taught metaphysics after the school of

the Imam Malik. When I was twenty five years

old I took as my wife the daughter of my uncle and

became a merchant.

JOURNEY TO THE BAHR-EL=GHAZAL, 1856.

"There was a well known merchant of Nagaa Hamada in Lower Egypt, called Ali Abu Amfiri, who was one of the most important traders in the

Bahr el Ghazal. With him my cousin Mohammed Abd el Qadir purposed to travel secretly : but when

I heard of the journey that he contemplated, mj-

heart was filled with compassion and sorrow, seeing

* Popular tradition makes him much older than 8i year^ of age.