414 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA. Chap. LXVI. 
It was Haj Mohammed A'skia who founded the 
new homonymous dynasty of the A'skia, by rising 
against his liege lord, the son of Sonni r Ali, and, after 
a desperate struggle, usurping the royal power ; and, 
notwithstanding the glorious career of that great 
conqueror, we may fancy we can see in the unfor- 
tunate circumstances of the latter part of the reign 
of that king, a sort of Divine punishment for the 
example which he had given of revolt. 
We have seen that the dynasty of the Za, of which 
that of the Sonni seems to have been a mere con- 
tinuation, immigrated from abroad; and it is a circum- 
stance of the highest interest to see king Mohammed 
A'skia, — perhaps the greatest sovereign that ever ruled 
over Negroland, — who was a native of this very 
country, born in the island of Neni, a little below 
Snider, in the Niger, setting us an example of the 
highest degree of development of which negroes are 
capable. For, while Sonni e Ali, like his forefathers, 
still belonged to that family of foreign settlers who 
either came from Yemen, according to the current 
tradition, or as is more credible, immigrated from 
Libya, as Leo states, the dynasty of the A'skia 
was entirely of native descent ; and it is the more 
remarkable, if we consider that this king was held 
in the highest esteem and veneration by the most 
learned and rigid Mohammedans, while Sonni e Ali had 
rendered himself so odious that people did not know 
how to give full vent to their indignation in heaping 
the most opprobrious epithets upon him. 
