EGYPT, AND SYRIA. 239 
gulfhed for their intolerance and brutality to ftrangers. Ril is 
inhabited partly by Furians ; but there are alfo fome foreign 
merchants. During the reign of Sultan Teraub there appear to 
have been many more there ; for he had built a houfe, and 
made the town his ufual refidence in time of peace. But Abd- 
el-rachman has abandoned it, probably from the fear attendant 
on ufurpation. Ril * is the key of the South and Eaft roads, as 
Cubcabia of the Weft, and Sweini of the North ; and therefore 
a Melek with a body of troops commonly refides there, as a 
guard to the frontier, and to keep the Arabs, who abound in 
that neighbourhood, in fubjedtion. It is a place eminently fit- 
ted for the Imperial refidence, being abundantly fupplied with 
frefh water from a large pool, which is never completely dry, 
with bread from Said f, with meat, milk, and butter from the 
Arabs, who breed cattle, and with vegetables from a foil well 
adapted to horticulture ; nor are they without a kind of tena- 
cious clay, which, with little preparation, becomes a durable 
material for building. In Shoba, another town of fome note, 
was an houfe of Sultan Teraub. The place is faid to be well 
fupplied with water, and there are fome chalk pits near it, from 
which that material was drawn at the time I was in the country. 
Thefe pits were then almoft exhaufted, for the purpofe of 
* Sultan Teraub ufed always to refide at Ril, but the prefent monarch, or 
ufurper, is induced by his fears to wander from place to place. The firfl; place 
I faw him at was HegUg ; the next was Tini ; the third was Tendeltiy where he 
pafl'ed about a year. 
f The Furians, it may be remarked, diftinguifli the South part of their empire 
by this terra, as well as the Egyptians. 
adorning 
