At Length, By The Assistance
Of My Guide, Who Acted As Interpreter, I Understood That One Of The
Spectators Pretended To Have Seen Me At One Place, And Another At Some
Other Place; And A Moorish Woman Absolutely Swore That She Had Kept My
House Three Years At.
Gallam, on the river Senegal.
It was plain that
they mistook me for some other person; and I desired two of the most
confident to point towards the place where they had seen me. They pointed
due south; hence I think it probable that they came from Cape Coast,
where they might have seen many white men. Their language was different
from any I had yet heard. The Moors now assembled in great numbers; with
their usual arrogance, compelling the Negroes to stand at a distance.
They immediately began to question me concerning my religion; but finding
that I was not master of the Arabic, they sent for two men, whom they
call _Ilhuidi_ (Jews), in hopes that they might be able to converse with
me. These Jews, in dress and appearance, very much resemble the Arabs;
but though they so far conform to the religion of Mahomet, as to recite,
in public, prayers from the Koran, they are but little respected by the
Negroes; and even the Moors themselves allowed, that though I was a
Christian, I was a better man than a Jew. They, however, insisted that,
like the Jews, I must conform so far as to repeat the Mahomedan prayers;
and when I attempted to waive the subject, by telling them that I could
not speak Arabic, one of them, a Shereef from Tuat, in the Great Desert,
started up and swore by the Prophet, that if I refused to go to the
mosque, he would be one that would assist in carrying me thither.
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