82 
TRAVELS IN AFKICA. Cha.p. LXXII. 
Bakdy, especially on his visit to Hamda-Alldhi some 
years previously, the inhabitants of the town had 
been allowed to repair that mosque at their own ex- 
pense. This had been accomplished at the cost of 
600 blocks or riis of salt, equal to about 200^. 
Besides levying this tax upon the inhabitants in 
general, they also devised means to subject to a par- 
ticular punishment the Arab part of the population 
who had especially countenanced the Sheikh in his 
opposition against their order to drive me out, by 
making a domiciliary search through their huts, and 
taking away some sixty or eighty bales or sunniye of 
tobacco, an article which, as I have stated on a former 
occasion, forms a religious and political contraband 
under the severe and austere rule of the Fiilbe in 
this quarter* 
This was the day on which the Sheikh 
March 24th. . t i 
had promised to bring out my luggage, but, 
to my great disappointment, he came empty-handed ; 
and again he had much to say about the expected 
arrival of Alkiittabu, the chief Somki, it was stated, 
having been called from A'ribmda to meet his liege 
lord at Ghergo (pronounced Kergo) with fifteen 
boats. But, as the sequel showed, this was a mere 
stratagem of that crafty chief, who intended to make 
an unexpected foray upon his foes the K^l-hekikan, in 
which enterprise he was perfectly successful, killing 
about a dozen of that already greatly reduced tribe. 
While the Sheikh boasted of the innumerable host 
which his friend the Tdrki chief carried with him, 
