people, very civil and disposed to oblige all for whom they have any regard, yet, with respect to their women, they appear to be unconscious that their conduct is quite irreconcilable with the precepts of the Koran, and the customs of their co-religionists.  They suffer them to go about with the face exposed—­to converse with the other sex in the roads, the streets, and the fields; and if the women are accustomed to grant their favors to their countrymen, as liberally and as frequently as they did to our soldiers, I should imagine that it must be more than commonly difficult, in this country, for a man to know his own father.[37]

On my return to camp, I was amused on the way by a dispute in connection with this subject, between the Malek I have mentioned and a soldier; it happened in the boat that brought me back to camp.  The boat was heavily laden, and this gigantic Malek was stepping into it, when the soldier I have mentioned intimated a determination to exclude him, calling him by several opprobrious names, and among other terms, “a pimp.”  Upon this, I checked the soldier, telling him that this man was a considerable personage in his country, and extremely hospitable to the Osmanlis.  This mollified the soldier, and the Malek took a place as well as he could.  The Malek then addressed the soldier in a mild manner, and asked him why he had bestowed such appellations upon one who was a Mussulman, as well as himself.  The soldier positively refused to allow the Malek’s claims to this honorable appellation.  The chief demanded upon what grounds the soldier denied it:  “Because,” said the soldier, “the women of your country are all whores, and the men all get drunk with bouza, araky, and other forbidden liquors, which you make out of durra and dates;” and turning to me, he demanded “whether he was not right?” The poor chief appeared to be much vexed that he was unable to reply to this accusation, and remained silent.  The soldier, not content with humbling the unlucky Malek, pursued his advantage without mercy.  “Come,” said he to the chief, “I do not believe that you know any thing about your religion, and I will soon make you sensible of it” He then asked the chief how many prophets had preceded Mohammed?  If he knew any thing about the history of Dhulkamein and Gog and Magog? and many others of a similar tenor:  how to answer which the unfortunate Malek was obliged to own his ignorance.  The soldier then told him that “the Commander of the Faithful,"[38] the chief of the Mussulmans, had authorized his Vizier, the Pasha Mehemmed Ali, to set the people on the upper parts of the Nile to rights, and that now the Osmanlis were come among them they would probably learn how to behave themselves.  The Malek might, however, have had his revenge upon the edifying soldier, had he known as well as I did that he had gone over to the town of Nousreddin expressly to amuse himself with the women of the country, and had doubtless paid as much attention to the bouza as the most sturdy toper in Berber.