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Updated: May 24, 2025
Theodore Bent's expedition was not sanctioned by Government, in spite of the fact that the Indian Government had actually placed at my husband's disposal a surveyor, Imam Sharif, Khan Bahadur. We had no assistance beyond two very inferior letters to the sultans of Makalla and Sheher, which made them think we were 'people of the rank of merchants, they afterwards said.
When we finally got off we found the old rascal had only sent half the Nahadi and had only sent two soldiers, and so had really made forty dollars out of us over that one item. The Nahad men had ten dollars each. They are not under the sultan of Makalla, but independent.
As for the soldiers, they sent, as if it were a matter of course, for some money to buy tobacco and were given two or three dollars each, and we gladly parted from them friends. The sultan of Makalla had paid them for a fortnight's food, and had written to Sultan Sal
Hitherto our way had been generally northward, from Makalla to Tokhum, north-east, and then north-west; now we turned westward down the great valley, though still with a slight northward tendency. We passed Ghanima, Ajlania on a rock to the right, and Henan and the Wadi Menwab behind it on our left.
Shibahm is now the property of the sultan of Makalla, but was administered by his cousin Sal
Another case, to which the botanist had to resort constantly, had always to be tied up with rope, as it had neither lock nor hinges. We were six days at Makalla arranging about camels and safe conduct, and wondering when we should get away; so of course we had plenty of time to inspect the town, which on account of the many Parsees had quite an Indian air in some parts.
The sultan's soldiers are nearly all slaves or of slave origin, and one of them, Muoffok, whose grandfather was a Swahili slave, and who had been one of our escort from Makalla, took us to his house, where his wife, seated unveiled in her coffee corner, dispensed refreshments to quite a large party there assembled, whilst Muoffok discoursed sweet music to us on a mandoline, and a flute made out of the two bones of an eagle placed side by side.
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