KASSALA— SABDERAT— ALGADEN— DOLKA. 249 



crowds, whom they never attack, whilst their own lives are protected by the sheikh 

 of Galâbat. 



Most of the residents in Metammeh are Takruri, who set the example of work 

 and industrial pursuits to the neighbouring peoples. Not only do the Takruri 

 import skins, coffee, salt, some stuffs and beasts of burden from Abyssinia, bartering 

 them. with the merchants of the Nile, but they also deal in the products of their 

 own country, honey, wax, tobacco, maize, gum, incense, dyes, and drugs. They 

 supply the Arabs with more than half of the cotton they use in weaving their togas. 

 From the provinces of the Sudan they receive more especially glass trinkets, arms, 

 and the talari, or Maria-Theresa crown-pieces, which are the exclusive currency in 

 northern Abyssinia. 



The slave trade in this district, till recently more active than all the others, 

 although officially forbidden at different times, has always been carried on. But 

 it is no longer openly conducted in public ; in 1879, the sum obtained by the sale 

 of slaves amounted to more than £20,000, At the time of the Egyptian rule, the 

 governor of Khartimi maintained a garrison of two thousand men in Galâbat. At 

 present Galâbat has become an independent principality, no longer paying tribute 

 either to Egypt or Abyssinia. 



Gedaref TOMAT. 



])oka, on the route from Metammeh to Abu-Ahraz, is a commercial outpost of 

 Galâbat situated at the confluence of the Rahad with the Blue Nile. But in this 

 lowland region the chief, if not permanent at least temporary, market is Sûk-Ahû- 

 Sin, or " Market of Father Sin," also called Gedaref after the province in which it 

 is situated. During the rainy season Sûk- Abu-Sin is visited only by the nomads 

 in the vicinity ; but directly the kharif is over, when the Atbara and the other 

 rivers of the plain are again fordable, and when the merchants have no longer to 

 dread the attacks of the venomous flies on their camels, the caravans arrive from 

 all parts, and as many as fifteen thousand persons are often assembled on the 

 market-place. Before the war, gum, wax, salt, cereals and cattle were the chief 

 wares in the market of Abu-Sin, and Greek merchants mingled with the crowds of 

 Arabs and Bejas. Tomat, at the junction of the Settit with the Atbara, is also a 

 town where a few exchanges take place ; Gos-Rejeb, on the left bank of the Atbara, 

 lies on the caravan route between Shendi and the port of Massawah. The ruins 

 pointed out by Burckhardt are a proof that the Egyptian merchants also passed 

 through this region on their journey from Meroë to the coast at Adulis Bay. 



Kassala — Sabderat — Algaden DOLKA. 



At the present time the most important town of the country is Kassala-el-Luz, 

 capital of the province of Taka, and, since 1840, the chief fortress of all the region 

 comprised between the Nile and the Red Sea ; it is also called Gash by the 

 natives, after the stream whose right bank it skirts. After having served as a 



