COMMERCE AND MARKET-PLACES. 
557 
Separated into several bodies, these merchants by birth 
have each of them his own route of commerce ; thus, 
there is one body of Jellaba who go annually to Runga ; 
another body frequents the copper-mines south of Dar-Fur ; 
others take their merchandise only to the distant provinces 
towards the S.W., viz. the territory of the Welad Bashicl 
and the neighbouring pagan countries on the borders of 
Bagirmi, namely, Bedanga, Gogomi, A'ndi; while others 
again visit the markets of Bagirmi, Logon, and Bornu ; 
some of them visiting Mas-efia during my residence in such 
numbers that they built a considerable village for themselves 
outside of the town, on the road to A'bu-Gher ; while another 
band visits annually the markets of Dar-Fur and Kordofan, 
others, and especially the wealthier individuals, frequently 
follow the recently-opened caravan-road to Ben-Ghazi, of 
whose history M. Fresnel has given such an elaborate ac- 
count. Each of these bodies when en route has its chief or 
agid appointed over them by the sultan, to whom he is re- 
sponsible for a handsome tax raised on the profit obtained. 
The principal objects of this commerce in general are the 
following articles : salt, brought by the Mahamid and the 
Tebu to Nimro and Wara, and bought by the Jellaba in large 
quantities, in order to be sold by them in detail to the most 
distant provinces — even as far as Logon; copper, brought 
chiefly from the famous copper-mine " el Hofrah," and from 
Runga, and exported, principally to Bornu, where it fetches 
a high price ; European articles, brought by the caravans from 
Ben-Ghazi, or imported also from Egypt by way of Dar-Fur, 
such as fine clothes, bernuses, coats of mail, beads, and other 
ornaments, calico, paper, needles, &c, ivory, principally 
taken in exchange from the Runga wy, the Welad Rashid, 
and in Bagirmi, in order to be exported, with very great 
profit from Wara to Ben-Ghazi ; asses, of the Eastern breed, 
very much in request in the western part of Sudan ; turkedi ; 
tobacco ; kohol ; and sundry other articles brought by the 
retail merchants of Hausa to Bagirmi, where they are taken 
