In the afternoon of the 15th of October (the eve of the great holiday) ten chiefs of the Kél-gerés, on horseback, entered the town, and towards evening news was brought that Astáfidet, the chief of the Kél-owí residing in Ásodi, was not far off, and would make his solemn entry early in the morning. My companions, therefore, were extremely busy in getting ready and cleaning their holiday dress, or “yadó,” and Hámma could not procure tassels enough to adorn his high red cap, in order to give to his short figure a little more height. Poor fellow! he was really a good man, and one of the best of the Kél-owí; and the news of his being killed, in the sanguinary battle which was fought between his tribe and the Kél-gerés in 1854, grieved me not a little. In the evening there were singing and dancing (“wargi” and “wása”) all over the town, and all the people were merry except the followers of Mákita, or Ímkiten, “the Pretender,” and the Sultan ʿAbd el Káder was obliged to imprison three chiefs of the Itísan, who had come to urge Mákita’s claims. It was on this occasion that I learnt that the mighty King of Ágades had not only a common prison, “gida-n-damré,” wherein he might confine the most haughty chiefs, but that he even exercised over them the power of life and death, and that he dispensed the favours of a terrible dungeon, bristling with swords and spears standing upright, upon which he was authorized to throw any distinguished malefactor. This latter statement, of the truth of which I had some doubt, was afterwards confirmed to me by the old chief Ánnur. In any case, however, such a cruel punishment cannot but be extremely rare. _Wednesday, October 16._—The 10th of Dhú el kádhi, 1266, was the first day of the great festival ʿAid el kebír, or Salla-léja (the feast of the sacrifice of the sheep), which in these regions is the greatest holiday of the Mohammedans, and was in this instance to have a peculiar importance and solemnity for Agades, as the installation of ʿAbd el Káder, who had not yet publicly assumed the government, was to take place the same day. Early in the morning, before daylight, Hámma and his companions left the house and mounted their camels, in order to pay their compliments to Astáfidet, and join him in his procession; and about sunrise the young chief entered and went directly to the “fáda,” at the head of from two hundred to three hundred Mehára, having left the greater number of his troop, which was said to amount to about two thousand men, outside the town.