The Military Strength Of Ludamar Consists In Cavalry.
They Are Well Mounted, And Appear To Be Very Expert In Skirmishing And
Attacking By Surprise.
Every soldier furnishes his own horse, and finds
his accoutrements, consisting of a large sabre, a double-barrelled gun, a
small red leather bag for holding his balls, and a powder-horn slung over
the shoulder.
He has no pay, nor any remuneration but what arises from
plunder. This body is not very numerous, for when Ali made war upon
Bambarra, I was informed that his whole force did not exceed two thousand
cavalry. They constitute, however, by what I could learn, but a very
small proportion of his Moorish subjects. The horses are very beautiful,
and so highly esteemed, that the Negro princes will sometimes give from
twelve to fourteen slaves for one horse.
Ludamar has for its northern boundary the Great Desert of Sahara. From
the best inquiries I could make, this vast ocean of sand, which occupies
so large a space in Northern Africa, may be pronounced almost destitute
of inhabitants, except where the scanty vegetation which appears in
certain spots affords pasturage for the flocks of a few miserable Arabs,
who wander from one well to another. In other places, where the supply of
water and pasturage is more abundant, small parties of the Moors have
taken up their residence. Here they live in independent poverty, secure
from the tyrannical government of Barbary. But the greater part of the
Desert being totally destitute of water, is seldom visited by any human
being, unless where the trading caravans trace out their toilsome and
dangerous route across it. In some parts of this extensive waste, the
ground is covered with low stunted shrubs, which serve as land-marks for
the caravans, and furnish the camels with a scanty forage. In other parts
the disconsolate wanderer, wherever he turns, sees nothing around him but
a vast interminable expanse of sand and sky; a gloomy and barren void,
where the eye finds no particular object to rest upon, and the mind is
filled with painful apprehensions of perishing with thirst. "Surrounded
by this dreary solitude, the traveller sees the dead bodies of birds,
that the violence of the wind has brought, from happier regions: and as
he ruminates on the fearful length of his remaining passage, listens with
horror to the voice of the driving blast, the only sound that interrupts
the awful repose of the Desert."[11]
[11] Proceedings of the African Association, part 1.
The few wild animals which inhabit these melancholy regions are the
antelope and the ostrich, their swiftness of foot enabling them to reach
the distant watering places. On the skirts of the Desert, where water is
more plentiful, are found lions, panthers, elephants, and wild boars.
Of domestic animals, the only one that can endure the fatigue of crossing
the Desert is the camel. By the particular conformation of the stomach,
he is enabled to carry a supply of water sufficient for ten or twelve
days; his broad and yielding foot is well adapted for a sandy country;
and by a singular motion of his upper lip, he picks the smallest leaves
from the thorny shrubs of the Desert as he passes along.
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