MOMBASAH TOWN. 



25 



European houses, the greater facility of commu- 

 nication, the presence of our ships in these ports, 

 and the more settled state of the Dominion, have 

 convinced Arabs, Banyans, and Wasawahili, that 

 it is vain to kick against the pricks in European 

 shape. Yet they yield unwillingly, knowing that 

 exploration will presently divert their monopoly 

 into other channels, and, quoting the Eiwayat or 

 rhymed prophecy, that sovereignty shall depart 

 from them w^hen the Pranks' first footstep shall 

 have defiled the soil. Even in our time (1857) 

 travellers should consider the countenance of the 

 Sayyid's government a sine qua non, and unless 

 marching in great force or prepared for universal 

 bakhshish, they should never make their starting- 

 point any port distant from head-quarters. 



The town of Mombasah, still called ' Mwita,' 

 meaning fight or battle, is mentioned in a.d. 

 1331 by the Shaykh Ibn Batuta, as a large place 

 abounding in fruits, and peopled by a ' chaste, 

 honest, and religious race.' Two centuries after- 

 wards the site is thus described by the Colto e 

 buon Luigi — as Camoens was termed by the 

 amiable Tasso. 



The isle before them stood so near the land, 

 that narrow was the strait which lay between ; 

 a city situate upon the strand 

 was on the seaboard frontage to be seen : 



