It was in this situation that, seeing no means of immediate relief, I began to feel impatience; which, as I continued in a state of perfect inactivity, communicated the more rapidly its pernicious influence to my state of health. On the fourteenth day after my arrival, I was attacked with a violent fever, attended with extreme pain in the head. How long it lasted I cannot precisely say, having on the second day lost my recollection. It was afterwards recalled by the effect of a dysentery, which lasted for two days, and left me too weak to assist myself. I had reflection enough to know, that of the aliments there to be procured, scarcely any could be found that would not be pernicious. After the first attack therefore, I confined myself to the use of bark and water, which last I drank in great quantities. A little more than a month had elapsed, when the symptoms appearing to diminish, I again pressed to be permitted to visit the residence of the Sultan. But I had reason to regret my impatience; for having at length obtained leave, I proceeded to El Fasher, only to repeat my suffering. The rainy season was almost at an end, but the air, which still continued insalubrious, fatigue, and anxiety renewed the malady, which, after extreme abstinence, and having gone through the short catalogue of remedies which I had had the precaution to take with me, I found unabated. Excessive headachs, lassitude, thirst, occasional constipation, succeeded by extreme irritation of the viscera, continued for several months to shew the inefficacy of my precautions, and to incapacitate me from all personal exertion. At length the heat of the ensuing summer gradually increasing, and producing regular and continued transpiration, and the state of the air then meliorated, having removed the cause of indisposition, it was not long before I gained a certain degree of strength. Arrived at El Fasher, I was first introduced to the Melek _Misellim_, one of the principal ministers. This man, when young, had been a slave, and engaged in domestic offices of the palace, but having been detected using some familiarities with one of the women, the monarch had ordered him to be deprived of the ensigns of manhood. Ignorant and uneducated, he appeared to have a certain quickness of apprehension, which, together with uncommon gaiety of humour, had rendered him acceptable at court, where he appeared more as a buffoon than a minister of state. He received me with a rude stare as an object he was unused to, which was followed by a mingled smile of contempt and aversion. He was seated with some other of the royal attendants, under a kind of awning of cotton cloth, on a mat spred upon the sand. After the common salutations, the Melek and his company entered into conversation on the nature of my visit to the country; and each made his remarks on my person, and offered his conjectures as to my character and intentions.