The messenger departed with my answer, and returned after a while with the _ultimatum_ of the governor, to the effect that it was his own opinion that no human being was able to prevent rain, but that all of us were servants of the Almighty, and that as they were praying for rain, I myself should add my prayer to theirs; I should then be allowed, at the proper time, to depart from them in safety, but that if I was ill- disposed towards them he likewise would do me evil, informing me at the same time that, for a similar reason, they had once killed two great religious chiefs from Bídderí. Such was the character of the people with whom I had to deal, although they regarded themselves as enlightened Mohammedans. In order to show his good disposition, or most probably rather in order to see whether his good treatment of me would have any effect upon the amount of rain (as he seemed to take me for a “king of the high regions”), he sent me in the evening a dish of an excellent pudding, with plenty of butter, and a small pot of medíde, or gruel seasoned with the fruit of the dúm- palm, and even promised me corn for my horse; but as I did not send him rain in return, as he seemed to have expected, his hospitality did not extend further. It had been my custom, when a thunderstorm was gathering, to look out, in order to see from what quarter it was proceeding, which is a question of great interest in these regions; but the absurd superstition of these people so alarmed me, that I scarcely dared to do so again. With regard to the superstition of the natives I must here mention a case which happened to my friend Sámbo. One day while I was engaged in earnest talk with him respecting the many sects of Islám, our conversation was suddenly interrupted by one of the daughters of the sultan entering abruptly, and accusing my friend, in the most offensive terms, of having abstracted from her, by his witchcraft, one of her slaves. But it was rather astonishing that a man with so vast an amount of learning was allowed to live at all, in the midst of such barbarians as these, without being continually suspected of sorcery and witchcraft. I shall not forget the day when I went to call on my friend, and found the unfortunate blind old man, sitting in his courtyard, in the midst of a heap of manuscripts which he could then only enjoy by touching them with his hands. Involuntarily I was reminded of a saying of Jackson’s, that the time would come when the texts of the classics would be emendated from manuscripts brought from the interior of Negroland.[42] From the very beginning, when I became aware of the character of these people, I had taken the greatest precautions; and hearing that the privilege of using a carpet was restricted to certain officers, I had stowed my old carpet away, although my couch, being on the bare ground, was not very soft.