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After this peace the Egyptians were able to concentrate their whole force against Leo VI., Prince of Smaller Armenia, who was brought as a prisoner to Cairo; and with him the supremacy of the Christians in this land was at an end: henceforth Egypt was ruled by Egyptian governors. Faraj, Berkuk's son and successor, had to suffer for his father's political mistakes.
These Bedawin make gunpowder for themselves; they find saltpetre in every cavern, and they buy from Egypt the sulphur which is found in their own hills. After a few minutes we left the Harr, which drains the tallest of the inland hillock-ranges, and the red block "Hamra el-Maysarah;" and we struck south-east into the Wady Sanawiyyah. It is a vulgar valley with a novelty, the Tamrat Faraj.
This was rather tame sport; but next day I had better fun. Starting in the early morning, accompanied by two of Sheikh Said's boys, Suliman and Faraj, each carrying a rifle, while I carried a shot-gun, we followed a footpath to the westward in the wilderness of Mgunda Mkhali.
He had scarcely ascended the throne when the Ottomans seized Derenda, Albustan, and Malatia. Preparations for war were made, but given up again when it was seen that Bayazid could not advance any farther south. Faraj was only thirteen years old, and all the old intrigues amongst the emirs broke out again.
They burnt incense before his shrine, and the captain devoutly said his evening prayer, whilst he of the tom-tom, Ahmet Faraj, stood behind and mimicked him, to the great amusement of his fellows a piece of irreverence I have never seen before in any Mohammedan country.
Tamerlane conquered the two important cities of Aleppo and Hemessa, and Faraj's forces returned to Egypt. When the sultan's ally, Bayazid, was defeated, Faraj concluded a peace with Tamerlane, at the price of the surrender of certain lands.
In the belief that Faraj was dead, Aziz was proclaimed his successor, but three months later Faraj was restored, and it was not until 1412 that he was charged with illegal practices and beheaded, his body being left unburied like that of a common malefactor.
In 1405 Tamerlane died, and Faraj was collecting troops for the purpose of recovering Syria when domestic troubles caused him to flee from Egypt, his own brother Abd el-Aziz heading the insurrection.
Ill-fed, dirty, unkempt men as our sailors were, we got to like them all, from the elderly dignified Mohammed, who thought he knew more about navigation than the captain, to Ahmet Faraj, the buffoon who played the tom-tom and made everybody laugh; this worthy individual was the recognised leader of all the festivities with which they regaled us from time to time, consisting of very ugly songs and a yet uglier dance, the chief art in which consisted in wagging their elastic tails with an energy which mortals further removed from monkey origin could never hope to approach.
Suliman by my side, with the instinct of a monkey, made a violent spring and swung himself by a bough immediately over the beast, whilst Faraj bolted away and left me single-gunned to polish him off.
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