DENHAM AND CLAPPERTON. 157 



antagonists, hardened by conflict with the Tuaricks, fighting 

 on foot with poisoned arrows longer and more deadly than 

 those of the Fellatas.* The sultan, however, contemplated 

 other means of securing success, placing liis main reliance 

 on his powers as a Mohammedan doctor and writer. Three 

 successive nights were spent in inscribing upon little scraps 

 of paper figures or words, destined to exercise a magical 

 influence upon the rebel host ; and their effect was height- 

 ened by the display of sky-rockets, supplied by Major Den- 

 ham. Tidings of his being thus employed were conveyed 

 to the camp, when the Mungas, stout and fierce warriors 

 who never shrunk from an enemy, yielded to the power of 

 superstition, and felt all their strength withered. It seemed 

 to them that their arrows were blunted, their quivers broken, 

 their hearts struck with sickness and fear ; in short, that to 

 oppose a sheik of the Koran who could accomplish such 

 wonders was alike vain and impious. They came in by 

 hundreds, bowing themselves to the ground, and casting 

 sand on their heads in token of the most abject submission. 

 At length, Malem Fanamy himself, the leader of the rebel- 

 lion, saw that resistance was hopeless. After vain over- 

 tures of conditional submission, he appeared in person, 

 mounted on a white horse, with a thousand followers. He 

 was himself in rags, and, having fallen prostrate on the 

 ground, was about to pour sand on his head, when the sul- 

 ^tan, instead of permitting this humiliation, caused eight 

 robes of fine cotton cloth, one after another, to be thrown 

 over him, and his head to be wrapped in Egyptian turbans 

 till it was swelled to six times its natural size, and no longer 

 resembled any thing human. By such signal honours the 

 sheik gained the hearts of those whom his pen had subdued ; 

 and this wise policy enabled him, not only to overcome the 

 resistance of this formidable tribe, but to convert them into 

 supporters and bulwarks of his power. 



Major Denham, who always sought with laudable zeal to 

 penetrate into every comer of Afirica, now found his way 

 in another direction. He had heard much of the Shary, a 

 great river flowing into the lake Tchad, and on whose banJcs 

 the kingdom of Loggun was situated. After several delays, 



* The group in the accompanying plate shows the three noted mili- 

 tary characters,— the Bornou horseman, the Kanemboo spearman, and 

 .he Munga bowman. 



O 



