THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 527 



to Sittina his filler, to whorti this country belongs, was then 

 with them, fo we did not fear them, otherwife there is not 

 a worfe fet of fanatical wretches, or greater enemies to the 

 name of Chriftian, than thefe are. 



As we are here fpeaking of Arabs and their names, I 

 fliall once for all obferve, that Wed,' a word which I have 

 frequently made ufe of in the courfe of this hiftory, and 

 which in this fenfe is peculiar to the kingdom of Sennaar, 

 does not mean river, though that is its import in Arabic. 

 Here it is an abbreviation of Welled, peculiar to the inhabi- 

 tants of this part of Atbara, who feem to have an averlioQ to 

 the letter 1 ; Wed el Faal, the fon of Faal ; Wed Hydar, the 

 fon of Hydar, or the lion ; Wed HafTan, the fon of Haflan, 

 and fo of the reft. For the fame reafon, Melek Sennaar, 

 the king of Sennaar, called Mek^ by throwing out the 1 ; 

 Abd el Mek, the flave of the king, inftead of Abd el Melek. 

 Here alfo I had the pleafure to find the language of the 

 Koran that of the whole people in common converfation ; 

 and as this was the book in which I firft ftudied the Ara- 

 bic, I found now a propriety and facility of expreilion I had 

 not been fenfible of before ; for that of the Koran, in Ara- 

 bia, is a kind of dead language, rarely underftood but by 

 men of learning.. 



At Wed Baal a Nagga there is a ferry for thofe who 

 go to Dongola by the defert of Bahiouda, Derreira is the 

 landing-place on the other fide ; I fuppofe it is to avoid 

 thefe Jaheleen that caravans ferry over at Gern rather 

 than come fo low as Wed Baal a Nagga. We left Maia at 

 half paft three in the afternoon, and, after going three 



miles. 



