The Sayyid’s matrimonial engagements were numerous. In 1827 he married the daughter of the Farmán-farmá (Governor) of Fars, and a grand- daughter of Fath ’Ali Shah, under an agreement in the marriage contract that the bride might spend every summer with her own family at Bandar Abbas or Shiraz. Disgusted with Arab homeliness, and with six years of monotonously hot life at Maskat, she obtained leave, and once in a place of safety she wrote back a strong epistle. It began, ‘Yá Dayyus! yá Mal’ún’, alluding to the report that Sayyid Khalid had violated the harem of his father, as the latter was also said to have done in his younger days. The Arab prince had lowered himself in the eyes of his subjects by representing himself to be a Shiah. She called him a dog- Sunni, and upon this ground she demanded instant divorce. The Sayyid despatched two confidential elders with orders to represent that his spouse could not legally claim such indulgence: a singular bastinado upon the soles of their feet soon made the venerable learned discover that divine right was upon the lady’s side. Her next exploit was to bowstring, in jealousy, a Katirchi (muleteer) with whom she had intrigued; and, driven from Shiraz by the fame of this exploit, she died at Kazimayn, in child-bed, her lover being this time a Hammamchi, or bath-servant. In A.D. 1833, four years after the death of Radama I., the Sayyid formed matrimonial designs upon the person of Ranavola Manjaka, Queen of the Hovas, and a personage somewhat more redoubtable than our good Queen Bess. Amongst his envoys on this occasion was one Khamisi wa Tání, who, under the Arabized name Khamis bin Osman, presently played some notable tricks upon the credulous ‘comparative geographer,’ Mr W. D. Cooley. The envoys were kept upon the frontier till the ‘Tangi-man’ arrived, bringing the Tangina. This nut, scraped in water, is administered as an ordeal, like the bitter water of the ancient Israelites and the poison nut of modern Calabar. The patient is ordered to walk about; after some 20 minutes he feels atrocious bowel-pains, prolapsus takes place, and he dies; if wealthy enough to pay the priest, another kind of nut is at once administered, and it may cure by emesis. As soon as this potion, which always destroys traitors with frightful torments, in fact, with the worst symptoms of Asiatic cholera, was proposed to the ambassadors, in order to prove the purity of their intentions, and their affection for the royal family, all fled precipitately, as may be imagined, from the ‘Great Britain’ of Africa. Sayyid Said was also unlucky in the choice of another Persian bride, the daughter of Irich Mirza, a supposititious son of Mohammed Shah, and hardly a second-class noble. She came to Zanzibar in A.D. 1849, accompanied by a train of attendants, including her Farráshas (carpet-spreaders), her Jilaudár (groom), and her private Jellád (executioner). She astonished the Arabs by her free