418 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER 
manage this excurfion to the cataract. “ Unlefs you had 
told me you was refolved, fays he, with a grave air, though 
full of opennefs and candour, I would, in the firft place, have 
advifed you not to think of fuch an undertaking ; thefe are 
unfettled times; all the country is bufhy, wild, and uninha-. 
bited, quite to Alata; and though Mahomet, the Shum, isa « 
good man, my friend and relation, and the king repofes 
truft in him, as he does in me, yet Alata itfelf is at any 
time but a bad, ftraggling place, there are now many ftran- 
gers, and wild people there, whom Mahomet has brought to 
his affiftance, fince Guebra Mehedin made the attack upon. 
him. If, then, any thing was to befal you, what fhould I 
anfwer to the king and the Iteghe? it would be faid, the 
Turk has betrayed him; though, God knows, I was never 
capable of betraying your dog, and rather would be poor 
all my life, than the richeft man of the province by do- 
ing the like wrong, even if the bad action was never to be 
revealed, or known, unlefs to my own heart. 
“ Mauomet, faid I, you need not dwell on -thefe profef- . 
fions ; I have lived twelve years with people of your religion, ~ 4 
my life always in their power, and I am now im your houfe, 
in preference to being in a tent out of doors with Netcho: 
and his Chriftians. I do not afk you whetherI am to go or 
not, for that is refolved on ; and, tho’ you are a Mahome- 
tan, and I a Chriftian, no rehgion teaches a man to do evil. 
We both agree in this, that God, who has protected me thus 
far, is capable to protect me likewife at the cataraét, and 
farther, if he has not determined otherwife, for my good ; 
Ionly afk you as aman who knows the country, to give 
me your beft ‘advice, how I may fatisfy my curicfity in 
this point, with as little danger, and as much expedition as 
potiible, 
