THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 47 1 



the great officers have all houfes of two. They have para- 

 pet roofs, which is a fingular conftrudlion ; f^r in other 

 places, within the rains, the roofs are all conical. The honfes 

 are all built of clay, with very little flraw mixed with it, 

 which fufficiently fhews the rains here mufl be lei's violent 

 than to the fouthward, probablv from the dillance of the 

 mountains. However, when I was there, a week of con- 

 ftant rain happened, and on the 30th of July the Nile increa- 

 fed violently, after loud thunder, and a great darknefs to the 

 fouth. The whole ftream was covered with wreck of houfes, 

 canes, wooden bowls, and platters, living camels and cat- 

 tle, and feveral dead ones pafTed Sennaar, hurried along by 

 the current with great velocity. A hyasna, endeavouring to 

 crofs before the town, was furrounded and killed by the in- 

 habitants. The water got into the houfes that ftand upon 

 its banks, and, by rifmg feveral feet high, the walls melt- 

 ed, being clay, which occafioned feveral of them to fall. It 

 feemed, by the floating wreck of houfes that appeared in 

 the ftream, to have deftroyed a great many villages to the. 

 fouthward towards Fazuclo. 



The foil of Sennaar, as I have already faid, is very unfa- 

 vourable both to man and beaft, and particularly adverfe to 

 their propagation. This feems to me to be owing to fome 

 noxious quality of the fat earth with which it is every way 

 furrounded, and nothing inay be depended upon more fure- 

 ly than the fact already mentioned, that no mare, or flie- 

 beait of burden, ever foaled in the town, or in any village 

 within feveral miles round it. 1 his remarkable quality 

 ceafes upon removing from the fertile country to the fands.. 

 Aira, between three and four miles from Sennaar, with no 

 water near it but the Nile, furrounded v/ith white barren 



fandjj 



