114 DAHLAK 



invited us to do the same. Then he talked to us in good 

 Italian and offered us, in accordance with Arabic custom, 

 two big cups of coffee with ginger and then, immediately 

 after this, perhaps to put out the fire within, two cups of 

 rather violent but excellent tea. All this time Tesfankièl 

 remained standing behind us, with the deeply satisfied air of 

 a butler to an important personage. From time to time he 

 glanced smugly at the other negroes and I am sure that 

 Tesfankièl that morning was the most envied man on earth. 



Sheik Serag presided over the problems of the island with 

 a fine understanding of the administration of and need for 

 justice, proving at the same time that he knew how to apply 

 the fundamental principles of his old Italian code of law. He 

 was the only administrator of justice and was consulted and 

 esteemed everywhere. It was said that in the fifty years he 

 had been living and during the twenty years he had been 

 governor of the people he had never made a false judgment. 

 He was well-disposed towards Italians. 



Towards the end of our visit he introduced us to his 

 youngest daughter, Khadigiah (the same name as the wife of 

 Mahomet). She was three years old, a beautiful creature, 

 with an almost fair skin, and was the offspring of Serag's 

 youngest wife (probably Arab) . She was dragged in by a man 

 who may have been the house-servant. She screamed and 

 scratched as if she had ten pairs of lungs and ten cats on her 

 chest. Her father succeeded, although not completely, in 

 calming her. Since all the others were laughing we asked 

 what was wrong. Sheik Serag explained, as he caressed her, 

 that she believed in the old wives' tales of the village, that 

 white men cut the ears off black children. Gigi and I felt 

 rather upset at being charged with such intentions, if only by 

 a child. It was so strange being taken for savages in a place 

 like Gembeli. 



