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Asking our people how long a simoum or ghiblee would blow in The Desert, they replied, "Never violently more than a couple of days." I do not recollect it once to have continued a whole day, but light south winds have prevailed for several days.
About nine in the morning a strong ghiblee got up, increasing till it became so violent that we encamped at once, not venturing to expose the slaves to this killing simoum. Covering up my face and mouth, I put my head into a pannier. I was almost suffocated it is true, still it was better than exposing myself to the searching flame of this furnace wind.
Never will be effaced from the tablet of my memory the prayer of a poor Negress girl, who, in the height of the simoum came running up to me, her eyes bloodshot, her face streaming with tears, "Buy me, Yâkob, O, buy me! I am very good, I will be good wife to you, and sleep with you. O, I'm dying! take me, buy me, buy me, Yâkob. The wind kills me."
I thought of nothing but water rivers, streams, rivulets, were the only ideas which presented themselves to my mind during this burning fever. In my impatience I cursed my companions, the country, the camels, and for anything I knew, the sun himself, who did not make sufficient speed to reach the horizon." "The Simoum felt like the blast of a furnace.
They got behind the camels or stooped under their bellies; they held up their barracans, taking it by turns to hold them up, by which means they sheltered five or six together; they concealed their faces and their bodies with their tattered garments; they invented all sorts of expedients to shelter themselves a moment against The Desert simoum.
I turned to look, but my eyes were so weak and strained, that I could see nothing upon the dreary face of the limitless plain. Essnousee swore to seeing a bright city of the Genii, and actually counted the number of the palaces and the palms. I believe our people were delirious from the effects of yesterday's simoum, for I did not observe mirage.
Water is so abundant, that the adjoining plain might be easily irrigated, and planted with ten thousand palms and forests of olives. God is bountiful in the Desert, but man wilfully neglects these aqueous riches springing up eternally to repair the ravages of the burning simoum! In one of the groves we met a dervish, who immediately set about charming our Boab.
Ghiblee or the Simoum; its terrible effects on our Caravan. Delusions of Desert, and bewilderment of our People. Disastrous Fate of the Young Tuscan. Snakes. Small capital of some Slave-Merchants. Arrival at Bonjem. Visit the Roman Ruins of Septimius Severus. The newly created Oasis. Regulations to mitigate Saharan Slave-traffic. My Imbroglio with Essnousee.
They proceeded on their last journey, the Tuscan riding the horse, the poor Arab boy going on foot, as guide to the well. The caravan weathers out the ghiblee the men covering up their faces and mouths from the scorching blast, afraid to breathe the killing air of the simoum the camels moaning in death-like tones, prophetic of the fate of those who had just gone!
Started, as the sun shewed his broad face above the horizon. Route till the afternoon, over a sandy, gravelly plain; then entered some hilly country, where we came to the well of Temet-Tar. Excessively hot again to-day, apparently the precursor of the Simoum the following day. In this Fezzanee caravan, it is our practice to halt at noon, or thereabouts, to take a little refreshment.
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