the surface of the wheat upon which all the passengers lye. On the least agitation of the waves, the sea getting in upon the wheat, increases its weight so prodigiously, that, falling below the level of the gunnel, the water rushes in between the plank and that part of the vessel, and down it goes to the bottom.
Though every day produces an accident of this kind from the same cause, yet such is the desire of gaining money in that season, which offers but once a-year, that every ship sails, loaded in the same manner as the last which perished. This was just the case with the vessel that had carried the Turks. Anxious to go away, they would not wait the signs of the weather being rightly settled. Ullah Kerim! they cry, 'God is great and is merciful'; and upon that they embark in a navigation, where it needs indeed a miracle to save them.
The Turks all came ashore but one; the youngest, and, according to all appearance, the best, had fallen over board and perished. The Bey received them, and with great charity entertained them all at his own expence, but they were so terrified with the sea, as almost to resolve never to make another attempt.
The Bey had brought with him from Jidda, a small, but tight vessel belonging to *[1] Sheher; which came from that country loaded with frankincense, the commodity of that
- ↑ * On the east coast of Arabia Felix, Syagrum Promontorium.
