On the 20th of January, 1853, I received from the hands of the Arab Mohammed el ʿAkerút, whom I have had occasion to mention previously[29], a valuable consignment, consisting of 1000 dollars in specie[30], which were packed very cleverly in two boxes of sugar, so that scarcely anybody became aware that I had received money, and the messenger seemed well deserving of a present equal to his stipulated salary; but I received no letters on this occasion. I had also expected to be able to replace here such of my instruments as had been spoiled or broken, by new ones; but I was entirely disappointed in this respect, and hence, in my further journey, my observations regarding elevation and temperature are rather defective. I then finished my purchases, amounting altogether to the value of 775,000 kurdí, of all sorts of articles which I expected would be useful on my further proceedings, such as red common bernúses, white turbans, looking-glasses, cloves, razors, chaplets, and a number of other things, for which I had at the time the best opportunity of purchasing, as all Arab and European merchandise, after the arrival of the káffala, was rather cheap. Thus I prepared for my setting out for the west; for although I would gladly have waited a few days longer, in order to receive the other parcel, consisting of a box with English ironware and 400 dollars, which was on the road for me by way of Kúkawa, and which, as I have stated before, had been entrusted, in Fezzán, to a Tebú merchant, it was too essential for the success of my enterprise that I should arrive in Kátsena before the Góberáwa set out on a warlike expedition against that province, for which they were then preparing on a grand scale. It was thus that the parcel above-mentioned, which, in conformity with my arrangements, was sent after me to Zínder by the vizier, and which arrived only a few days after I had left that place, remained there in the hands of the sheríf el Fási, and, on his being assassinated in the revolution of 1854, and his house plundered, fell into the hands of the slaves of the usurper ʿAbd e’ Rahmán. [Footnote 20: See what I have said about this tree in Vol. I. p. 522.] [Footnote 21: Vol. II. p. 72.] [Footnote 22: See Vol. II. p. 192.]