16 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA. 
Chai>. LIU. 
We encamped after a march of about thirteen 
miles, having by mistake exchanged our westerly di- 
rection for a south-westerly one, near the well called 
Kagza # , and were very hospitably and kindly treated 
by a patriotic old man, a citizen of the old capital 
or birni of Ghasr-eggomo, who, when that splendid 
town was taken by the Fiilbe or Fellata, in the year 
1809, had fled to Waday, and had lived there several 
years among the Welad Rashid, waiting for better 
times. This good man described to me, with a deep 
feeling of sorrow, the taking of that large and 
wealthy town, under the command of the Fiilbe 
chiefs Mala-Rida, Mukhtar, and Hannima, when the 
king, with his whole host of courtiers and his nu- 
merous army, fled through the eastern gate while 
the enemy was entering the western one, and the 
populous place was delivered up to all the horrors 
accompanying the sacking of a town. What with 
the pleasant character of the country and the 
friendly disposition of our host, I should have en- 
joyed my open encampment extremely, if I had not 
been suffering all this time very severely from sore 
legs, ever since my return from Bagirmi, when I had 
to cross so many rivers and was so frequently wet 
through.f 
* The depth of the well measured twenty-two fathoms. 
j" This is a complaint to which almost every European in these 
climes is exposed, and from which Clapperton suffered very severely. 
I found the best remedy to be mai-kadena butter, which is very 
cooling ; but in the eastern part of Bornu it is rarely to be met with. 
