ROME SUEZ PANAMA . 1 43 



originally sent his brother-in-law into the Soudan 

 with 100,000 men, and he had brought back with 

 him the same number of slaves. He afterwards sent 

 one of his sons to collect the tributes, or taxes, which 

 his brother-in-law had levied upon the country. 

 These taxes consisted of a thousand articles of each 

 kind viz., a thousand loads of straw, a thousand loads 

 of wood, a thousand loads of corn, a thousand maidens, 

 and a thousand male slaves ; all of this was brought 

 in and placed in the camp. But the chiefs of the 

 country formed a plot to destroy the camp, and at 

 night, while the leaders of the force were celebrating 

 their captures, they set fire to the wood and straw, 

 so that not a man escaped alive. I accordingly 

 advised the Viceroy to take only a few soldiers, 

 besides myself, and to confer upon these populations 

 just and beneficent laws. 



We reached the frontiers of Egypt, near Korosko, 

 and went on to Bou- Ahmed, on the confines of the 

 Desert, having with us two caravans, which kept two 

 days' march apart from each other, so as not to exhaust 

 the water which was to be had on the road. At Bou- 

 Ahmed I wished the Viceroy a " Happy new year," 

 and in the evening rejoined him at Berber, which is - 

 close by. I found him in a terrible state of excite- 

 ment, shedding copious tears, and when I asked him 

 what was wrong, he told me that he was weeping 

 over the misery which his family had wrought in the 

 country. He said that since his arrival he had received 



