On the sale of every slave, he has, in addition to the head-money, a dollar and a half, which, at the rate of 4,000, gives another 6,000 dollars.  The captured slaves are sold by auction, at which the sultan’s brokers attend, bidding high only for the finest.  The owner bids against them until he has an offer equal to what he considers as the value of the slave; he has then three-fourths of the money paid to him, while one-fourth is paid by the purchaser to the sultan.  Should the owner not wish to part with his slaves, he buys them in, and the sum which he last names, is considered as the price, from which he has to pay the sultan’s share.  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.  With respect to the household slaves, little or no difference is to be perceived between them and freemen, and they are often entrusted with the affairs of their master.  These domestic slaves are rarely sold, and on the death of any of the family to which they belong, one or more of them receive their liberty; when, being accustomed to the country, and not having any recollection of their own, they marry, settle, and are consequently considered as naturalised.  It was the custom, when the people were more opulent, to liberate a male or female on the feast of Bairam, after the fast of Rhamadan.  This practice is not entirely obsolete, but nearly so.  In Mourzouk there are some white families, who are called mamlukes, being descended from renegades, whom the bashaw had presented to the former sultan.  These families and their descendants are considered noble, and, however poor and low their situation may be, are not a little vain of their title.