142 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA. 
Chap. LXXV. 
was to form a part, till December, when it had al- 
ready returned to England. 
I thanked the Sheikh for having at length put me in 
possession of these despatches, but I repeated at the 
same time my previous remark, that if he and his friends 
wanted to have " imana," or well established peaceable 
intercourse with us, security ought first of all to pre- 
vail as to our letters, and I was assured that this parcel 
had been lying in A'zawad for at least two months. 
But the Sheikh excused himself, stating that one of 
the chief men in that district, probably the chief of 
the Berabish, had kept them back under the im- 
pression that they might contain something pre- 
judicial to his country ; an opinion which, of course, 
could not fail to be confirmed by the proceedings of the 
French in the south-western districts bordering upon 
Algeria. But, altogether, the history of this parcel 
was marvellous. It had evidently come by way of 
B6rnu ; yet there was not a single line from the 
vizier, who, if all had been right, I felt sure would 
have written to me ; moreover, the outer cover had 
been taken off, although the seal of the inner parcel 
had not been injured. But the reason, of which I, 
however, did not become aware till a much later 
period, was this, that, before the parcel left S6koto, 
the news of the execution of the vizier had already 
reached that place, when the letter addressed by that 
person to myself was taken away, and probably also 
something else which he had sent for me. But, it 
moreover happened that the man who was com- 
