_They._--"The Touaricks brought him from Bornou." "What are they going to do with him?" _They._--"The Touaricks will send him to Tripoli, and sell him; will you buy him?" "No, no; if I buy him, my sultan will put me in prison." (_They_, one to the other.--"Do you believe him?") "The English had many slaves, but gave them all the _âtka_; and soon, please God, they will destroy slavery in all the world." _They._--"Ah, ah," (laughing), "that's right; we wish to have the _âtka_." I found some were from Soudan, others from Timbuctoo, the greater part from Bornou. About a score of them were present; their greatest delight was in exchanging their various lingos. When they heard I was going to Kanou, one jumped up like a fury, saying, "Oh, I must send something to my mother." This was a poor grey-headed wrinkled-faced old man! His poor mother, alas! may have been long ago whipped to death upon the cotton plantations of South Carolina, where the blood of the slave is poured out to fertilize the fields of pampered republicans, and give tongue to the braggadocio of the free sons of the Model-Republic! To-day, saw three swallows in a garden for the first time at Ghadames. They darted over the heads and through the foliage of the graceful palms, performing sweet eccentric circles. To me, they were winged messengers from the fair bowers and silvery brooks of Paradise. To give an idea of the general ignorance of the Ghadamsee people on European geography, I have only to record a part of a conversation with them. _They._--"Where's your country; is it near Rome?" "No; further to the west and north." _They._--"Did not the English spring from the Arabs?" "No; the English are from the north, a colder country; the Arabs are from a hot country." _They._--"Are the Greeks like the English? and is their country near yours?" "No; they are farther from us than Rome itself." _They._--"Do the English fast?" "Sometimes; but when they fast they don't eat in the night time, like you; they fast day and night." _They._--"That's not good; that's not right. Do you fast?" "Never, thank God." The people bother my life out about fasting. Two young Touarick women came to me-- "Thou Christian! dost thou fast?" (they having never seen a person before who did not fast). "No; the Christians don't fast." _The girls._--"Don't the Christians know God?" "Yes, they know God." _The girls._--"No, they don't, for they don't say Mahomet is the prophet of God."