The Trees, Which Are His Private Property, Produce About 6,000 Camel Loads Of Dates, Each Load 400 Pounds Weight, And Which May Be Estimated At 18,000 Dollars.

Every garden pays a tenth of the corn produced.

The gardens are very small, and are watered, with great labour, from brackish wells. Rain is unknown, and dews never fall. In these alone corn is raised, as well as other esculents. Pomegranates and fig-trees are sometimes planted in the water-channels. Presents of slaves are frequently made, and fines levied. Each town pays a certain sum, which is small; but as the towns are numerous, it may be averaged to produce 4,000 dollars. Add to this his annual excursions for slaves, sometimes bringing 1,000 or 1,600, of which one-fourth are his, as well as the same proportion of camels. He alone can sell horses, which he buys for five or six dollars, when half starved, from the Arabs, who come to trade, and cannot maintain them, and makes a great profit by obtaining slaves in exchange for them. All his people are fed by the public, and he has no money to pay, except to the bashaw, which is about 15,000 dollars per annum. There are various other ways, in which he extorts money. If a man dies childless, the sultan inherits great part of his property; and if he thinks it necessary to kill a man, he becomes his entire heir.

In Mourzouk, about a tenth part of the population are slaves, though many of them have been brought away from their native country so young as hardly to be considered in that light.

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