It might be asked why we, knowing that the guards would purloin the greater part of the food sent in, did not arrange for a larger quantity to be sent. There are two reasons, and the first is the least of the two: the guards knew very well what was the minimum amount of food to keep us alive, and just that quantity of food |113| would be allowed to pass the portals of the Saier. The second reason was, that the sight of more or better food being brought to a prisoner proved one of two things: either the prisoner himself had received some money, or his friends had, and the following day the time-worn Nebbi Khiddr tale, properly translated, meant chains until more dollars were forthcoming. Under such circumstances, the unlucky offender against Saier politics would be called upon by the other mulcted prisoners to make good the money they had been bled of, for the Saier was most impartial in the matter of chains, and, certain of always getting the proper victim in the end, invariably loaded a dozen or so with extra chains, and ordered all into the Umm Hagar. An attenuated and burned chicken, or pigeon, cost a few dollars in repentance, and also the wearing of extra chains and the horrors of the Umm Hagar for nights, for it was advisable to keep Idris waiting some days for an evidence of repentance, so that he should believe, and the Khaleefa’s attendants believe also, that some little difficulty had been experienced in collecting the few dollars you had to pay.
Our usual food was “Asseeda,” the Soudan dourra (sorghum), roughly pounded moist, and mixed into a thick paste, feeling and tasting to the palate like sawdust. It was not a very nourishing dish, but it was a heavy one, and stayed the pangs and gnawings of hunger. A flavour might be imparted by allowing a quantity to stand for a day or two until fermentation set in. Occasionally, but only occasionally, a sauce |114| made from the pounded seed of the Baamia hybiscus, and called “Mulakh,” could be obtained, and this, with the fermented asseeda, made a veritable banquet. Friends in the town sent us, when they could either afford or obtain it, a little wheaten bread, a bit of cheese or butter, or a few pinches of coffee.