HISTORICAL SKETCH OF WA'da'y. 
531 
far from the seats of the Malanga, and after a sanguinary 
battle the son succeeded in vanquishing his father, who was 
killed in the year 1805. These are well-known facts, which 
cannot be denied. 
'Abd el Kerim, better known under his surname Sabun, 
which he received at a later time, mounted the throne of 
Waday, stained with the blood of his father, and began a 
reign which all agree in representing as one of the wisest 
ever known in this part of the world. 
First, he enriched himself and his country by the spoil of 
Bagirmi, whose inhabitants were much further advanced in 
civilization than their eastern neighbours ; and by their pre- 
datory expeditions to Dirki, had amassed a great deal of 
riches, consisting not only of fine clothes, and merjan or coral, 
but even of silver, of which c Abd el Kerim is said by trust- 
worthy persons to have carried away with him five camel- 
loads, being equal to about fifteen hundred pounds' weight. 
It was also during his reign, as I have stated before, that 
Bagirmi became for ever a tributary province of Waday. 
Having then founded a powerful kingdom, it formed the chief 
object of his exertions to establish a direct communication 
with the ports on the coast of the Mediterranean, in order to 
supply himself with those manufactures which, before the 
spoil of Bagirmi, had been almost unknown to the people of 
Waday. 
But to the account of the exertions of 'Abd-el-Kerim in 
this field, such as has been given by the late M. Fresnel, in 
his memoir on Waday, I have nothing to add, as it no doubt 
formed the chief subject of his inquiries ; but the account given 
by that gentleman of the king's death, and of the reign of 
his successor, is full of errors. 'Abd el Kerim Sabun died 
in the tenth year of his reign, which falls in the year 1815, 
in a place close to Wara, called Junne, where he had collected 
an army, in order, as I have been assured by well-informed 
persons, to make war upon the ruler of Bornu, or rather on the 
sheikh Mohammed el Kanemi ; who, endeavouring to restore 
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