THESOURCE OF THE NILE. 445
any money I fl^.ould need at Sennaar. He welcomed me with great kindnefs, and repeated teftimonics of joy and wonder at my fafe arrival. He had been down in Atbara at Gerri, or Ibme villages near it, with merchandize, and had not yet feen the king fince he came home, but gave me the very worft defcription poiUble of the country, info- much that there feemed to be not a fpot, but the one I then Hood on, in which I was not in imminent danger of deftruc- tion, from a variety of independent caufes, which it feemed not pofllbly in my pow^er to avoid. He fent me in the even- ing fome refrefhments, which I had long been unaccuftom- ed to; fome tea, excellent coffee, fome honey and brown fugar, feveral bottles of rack, likewife nutmegs, cinnamon,, ginger, and fome very good dates of the dry kind which? he had brought from Atbara.
Hagi Belal was a native of Morocco. He had been at €airo, and alfo at Jidda and Mocha. He knew the Englifh well, and profeffed himfelf both obliged and attached to them. It was fome days before I ventured to fpeak to him upon money bufmefs, or upon any probability of finding, affiftance here at Sennaar. He gave me little hopes of the latter, repeating to me what I very well knew about the dif- agreement of the king and Adelan. He feemed to place all his expectations, and thofe were but faint ones, in the co- ming of Shekh Abou Kalec from Kordofan. He faid, no- thing could be expected from Shekh Adelan without going to Aira, for that he would never trull: himfelf in Sennaar,, in this king's lifetime, h\n that the miniller was abfolute the. moment he affembled his troops without the town.
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