HISTORY. 17 ma (Sheikh Moosa), el Messerie (Sheikh Labaied), Koncieri or Darfiirer, Pergu, and Nas-Gioffon ;* but these people may be arranged collectively under three heads, namely : the Negroes ; the Bakkari and Arabs or free people ; and the Dongolavi. All these various tribes differ in their manners and customs, if not totally, at least to a certain extent, and speak thirteen dialects and languages among them.

The total population of Kordofan may be computed at 400,000 souls, excluding the nomadic Bakkari. The Defturdar did all in his power to degrade this country, and his name is, even at the present day, a word of terror to the natives. Terribly, indeed, the tyrant abused his authority in this unhappy country; no pen can describe the cruelties which he perpetrated in the province. Human nature revolts at hearing the inventions of this ruffian, practised upon his unfortunate \'ictims for the mere gratification of his passion of cruelty. I should not have believed every rumour, or have regarded the accounts I heard of the atrocities of this man, for the most part, in the light of fiction, if I had not received corroborating evidence in all the districts of Kordofan, Sennaar and Eg}'pt, through which I travelled ; tales the more worthy of credit, inasmuch as many persons are yet living who were not only • The German orthography has been generally followed, as it ig impossible to give the exact spelling of these names, without being furnished with the Arab characters. Tb,