For Two Successive Nights They
Neglected To Send Us Our Accustomed Meal; And Though My Boy Went To
A Small Negro Town Near The Camp, And Begged With Great Diligence
From Hut To Hut, He Could Only Procure A Few Handfuls Of Ground
Nuts, Which He Readily Shared With Me.
We had been for some days in daily expectation of Ali's return from
Saheel (or the north country) with his wife Fatima.
In the
meanwhile, Mansong, king of Bambarra, as I have related in Chapter
VIII., had sent to Ali for a party of horse to assist in storming
Gedingooma. With this demand Ali had not only refused to comply,
but had treated the messengers with great haughtiness and contempt;
upon which Mansong gave up all thoughts of taking the town, and
prepared to chastise Ali for his contumacy.
Things were in this situation when, on the 29th of April, a
messenger arrived at Benowm with the disagreeable intelligence that
the Bambarra army was approaching the frontiers of Ludamar. This
threw the whole country into confusion, and in the afternoon Ali's
son, with about twenty horsemen, arrived at Benowm. He ordered all
the cattle to be driven away immediately, all the tents to be
struck, and the people to hold themselves in readiness to depart at
daylight the next morning.
April 30. - At daybreak the whole camp was in motion. The baggage
was carried upon bullocks - the two tent poles being placed one on
each side, and the different wooden articles of the tent distributed
in like manner; the tent cloth was thrown over all, and upon this
was commonly placed one or two women; for the Moorish women are very
bad walkers.
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