But the Rais boasts of having done something to mitigate the mutual antipathies of the factions. "The _Shamātah_, between them," he says, "has had its neck broken." And really, if it be the case, there is in this some compensation for the wrongs and miseries which the Turks are inflicting upon an impoverished and over burthened people. In other parts of Northern Sahara similar factions exist, often arising from chance divisions of towns. There is a similar division of the town of Ghabs in Tunis, but not carried to such extreme lengths as these factions of Ghadames. It would seem that society could not exist without party and divisions no more than a British Parliament. Even Scripture intimates there must be strifes and divisions. Many came to me to hear the news from Tripoli and Algeria. I found them all interested in the fate and fortunes of the latter country. Some vague rumours had reached them of serious and bloody skirmishes. I calmed them, telling them "all people were on an equal footing in Algeria, Christians as Mussulmans, even as Mussulmans were in our British India." Some doubted my information. Late in the evening, when the visitors of the Rais had retired, I had a tête-à-tête with his Excellency. Speaking of the Ghadamseeah, his Excellency said, "They are ignorant and know not the _tareek_ (_i. e._, system) of the Sultan; they magnify every trifle of news they hear, and are now alive to every change, and in feverish expectation of some new event." This is always the case with the oppressed; they must love change, if but for the worse. His Excellency then continued: "Since the forced contribution of fifty thousand dollars, no money is to be found. The money due for the past four months is still uncollected." Speaking of the bandits, his Excellency said, "The Pasha has written to me that he cannot allow me, or the Commandant of The Mountains, to march out against the _Sebâah_ or _Shânbah_, without an order from the Sultan, but with such an order we could soon exterminate them." Our Rais does not entirely neglect the intellectual edification of his Desert subjects. This evening, early, he amused them with talking about steamboats, or "boats of fire." I put in a word about railroads, telling them with a railway we could come from Tripoli to Ghadames in two days. "The Christians know all things but God," said a Marabout.