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Updated: June 13, 2025
I formed to-day a closer acquaintance with my fellow-travellers; for, in small caravans, every one endeavours to be upon friendly terms with his companions. They were Malays, or, as they are called in the Levant, Jawas; and, with the exception of a few of them, who came from the coast of Malacca, all British subjects, natives of Sumatra, Java, and the coast of Malabar.
Tallika, the frontier town of Bondou towards Woolli, is inhabited chiefly by Foulahs of the Mahomedan religion, who live in considerable affluence, partly by furnishing provisions to the coffles, or caravans, that pass through the town, and partly by the sale of ivory, obtained by hunting elephants; in which employment the young men are generally very successful.
Last year the first caravans left Feng-chen with wireless equipment for the eighteen hundred mile journey across Mongolia to Urumchi in the very heart of central Asia. Construction at Urga is well advanced and it will soon begin at Kashgar.
At Fort Laramie two large trains were put in charge of Lew Simpson, as brigade wagon-master, and Will was installed as courier between the two caravans, which traveled twenty miles apart plenty of elbow room for camping and foraging.
Another memorable raid was made by the savages on the old line mail-route on Sunday, the 7th of August, 1864. It was a simultaneous attack on that portion of the line extending over two hundred miles from Julesburg eastwardly to Liberty Farm, at the head of the Little Blue River. The mail-coaches, the stations, travelling freight caravans, ranches, and parties putting up hay were alike attacked.
The Bedouin Arab is the chief trial of the caravans. He is always a foe to them; and although he ostensibly herds camels and horses, his real occupation is robbery and pillage. For days nomadic Arabs will follow a caravan, keeping always out of sight. Most likely a band of a dozen or more mounted on swift horses will survey the caravan from a distance at which they are not likely to be discovered.
I returned to my wife and children with delight after my journeys of suffering and privation, and fully appreciated the value of my home from the short time that my occupation would permit me to remain there. I worked hard and became rich. It was during a painful march through the Desert with one of the caravans, that a favourite she-camel foaled.
We alighted on the spot where the pilgrim caravans repose on the day before they reach Mekka, in a part of the valley of Fatme, called Wady Djemmoum. Wady Fatme is low ground, abounding in springs and wells; it extends in an E.N.E. direction to the distance of four or five hours, until it nearly joins Wady Lymoun.
Already caravans were astir, and we passed lines of laden camels now almost at the end of the long journey from Outer Mongolia, whither we were bound. But, instead of splendid beasts with upstanding humps and full neck beards, the camels now were pathetic mountains of almost naked skin on which the winter hair hung in ragged patches.
Elsewhere we hear of the "travelling companies of the Dedanim," of the men of Sheba bringing their gold and frankincense; of a multitude of camels coming up to Palestine with wood from Kedar and Nebaioth. Heeren is entirely justified in his conclusion that the land trade of the Phoenicians was conducted by "large companies or caravans, since it could only have been carried on in this way."
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