last state, to hinder those of Dendera from coming up the river to eat them.
About noon we passed Coom Ombo, a round building like a castle, where is supposed to have been the metropolis of Ombi, the people last spoken of. We then arrived at Daroo *[1], a miserable mansion, unconscious that, some years after we were to be indebted to that paltry village for the man who was to guide us through the desert, and restore us to our native country and our friends.
We next came to Shekh Ammer, the encampment of the Arabs †[2] Ababdé, I suppose the same that Mr Norden calls Ababuda, who reach from near Coffeir far into the desert. As I had been acquainted with one of them at Badjoura, who desired medicines for his father, I promised to call upon him, and see their effect, when I should pass Shekh Ammer, which I now accordingly did; and by the reception I met with, I found they did not expect I would ever have been as good as my word. Indeed they would probably have been in the right, but as I was about to engage myself in extensive deserts, and this was a very considerable nation in these tracts, I thought it was worth my while to put myself under their protection.
Shekh Ammer is not one, but a collection of villages, composed of miserable huts, containing, at this time, about a thousand effective men: they possess few horse, and are
