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Updated: May 21, 2025
They had driven horses, camels, sheep, goats, donkeys, as far as Keneh, even as far as Siout, for sale; and the desert was familiar to them. The salt sea had rolled its blue waves beneath their eyes; and they had been as far as the Gebel-el-Elbi, that mysterious stronghold of the Bisharee, far to the south, in the wildest region of the desert.
Ismaeen at first did not seem to attach any importance to the subject, gave me but a cursory answer, and proceeded to relate how he had sold donkeys for sixty piastres at Siout which were only worth thirty at most at Fares; but I returned to the charge, and after looking at me somewhat slyly perhaps, to ascertain if I was not making game of him by affecting an interest in these things, the young Ababde, with the sublime inattention to positive geography and record history characteristic of Eastern narrative, spoke nearly as follows:
The Egyptian tobacco, sometimes mixed with that of Sennar, is the cheapest, and in great demand throughout the Hedjaz. There are two sorts of it: the leaf of one is green, even when dry; this is called ribbe, and comes from Upper Egypt: the other is brown-leaved, the best sort of which grows about Tahta, to the south of Siout.
The most considerable place in Kasym is Aneyzy, said to be equal in size to Siout in Upper Egypt, which contained, according to the French computation, three thousand houses. Aneyzy has bazars, and is inhabited by respectable Arab merchants.
Ismaeen, it is true, did not seem to think much of these wild and romantic journeyings. He laid more stress on having seen the beautiful city of Siout, where I have no doubt he felt the mingled contempt and admiration ascribed to the Yorkshireman when he first visits London.
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