The city of Sennaar is of an oblong form, its longest side opposite the river.  It stands not at any distance from the river, but directly upon its west bank, which consists hereabouts of hard clay.

The river is now rising,[54] but exhibits itself at present to the view as narrow and winding, as far as the eye can reach, between sand flats, which will shortly be covered by its augmenting waters.  The bed of the Nile opposite Sennaar may be reckoned at about half a mile broad.

The environs of Sennaar are wide plains, containing large and populous villages.  A long ragged mountain, the only one visible, stands about fifteen miles to the west of the town.  Below the town is a small but pretty island, whose inhabitants thrive by raising vegetables for the market of Sennaar; and the opposite bank of the river, presents several verdant patches of ground devoted to the same object.[55] Beyond these spots, the country on the other bank appeared to be mostly covered with trees and bushes, among which I saw four elephants feeding.

I could not find any remains of any very ancient building in Sennaar during my stay, and I believe that none exists there.  Such is the present appearance of a town which has evidently been once rich, comfortable and nourishing, but which, for eighteen years past, as I have been informed, has been the lacerated prey of War and Confusion.

On the day after our arrival the conditions of the accord between the Pasha and the Sultan of Sennaar were arranged and sealed; by which the latter recognized himself as subject and feudatory of the Grand Seignor, and surrendered his dominions to the supremacy and sway of the Vizier of the Padischah, Mehemmed Ali Pasha.  The next day the Tchocadar Aga of his Highness the Viceroy of Egypt, who had arrived in our camp two months past, embarked in the canja of the Pasha Ismael to carry the documents of this important transaction to Cairo.

For several days after our arrival at Sennaar, our camp was incommoded by furious squalls of wind, accompanied with thunder, lightning, and torrents of rain.  The Pasha therefore determined to caserne the troops in the houses of the town, and to stay there during the rainy season.  In ten days after our arrival, the army was distributed throughout the town and in the villages on the opposite bank of the river.  The Pasha himself took up his quarters in a large house of the Sultan of Sennaar, which had been prepared for his accommodation.

A few days after our arrival, a slave informed the Pasha that the Sultan of Sennaar, before our arrival, had thrown into the river some cannon.  The Pasha ordered search to be made; four iron guns were discovered by divers, and were dragged on shore.  They appeared to me to be ordinary ship guns; no mark or inscription was found on them to enable me to judge where they were fabricated.  I believe them however to have been originally obtained of the Portuguese by the Abyssinians, from whom the people said the Sultan of Sennaar had taken them in some ancient war between the two kingdoms.