The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 | Page 7

get up until a guard came along with his great whip which brought blood at each lash. As the great army passed through the gate of the city, an officer of the Sultan examined every slave to be sure none was a Fellatah, Mohammedan, or Jew. The Ghat caravan happened to have among its slaves a Fellatah, who was at once discovered and set free. At the first camp, says Daumas, "Each caravan established its bivouac separately, and as soon as the camels were crouched, and after having chained our Negro women by the feet and in groups of eight or ten, we forced our Negro men to aid us, with the left hand which we had left free, to unload our baggage, to arrange it in a circle and to stretch in the center the tents which we had brought from Katsena. Two or three of the oldest women that we had not put in chains, but who had always had their two feet fettered, were directed to prepare our supper. We ate in groups of four. This sad supper over, we placed the guards around our camp, and made the slave women and men sleep as before said."[12]
The next day the caravans were obliged to stop in consequence of a Negro woman who gave birth to a child. This stop, however, was not very lengthy. In a few hours she and her infant were placed upon a camel and the caravan went forward. When the camp was pitched for the next night, the leader, in making his rounds, ordered that the young Negro mother be left unshackled, and that she be given some meat for supper and allowed to sleep warmly upon a mat. But during the night, when everything was quiet, the mother put her infant in a basket filled with ostrich feathers, placed it upon her head, and made her escape.
Next morning, upon discovering her flight, several bands of men were sent out in different directions to find her. One of these, after a few hours of search, found her in a thicket nursing her child. She was led back to the camp, and two gun-shots recalled the other bands, and the caravans then resumed their march. The caravans stopped at Aghezeur to replenish their provisions and make repairs; and up to that time none of the people had died, and only one camel was lost.
After a month's traveling they reached "Ogla d'Assaoua," which was a rendezvous for all the marauding bands that returned from the Sudan. It was particularly dangerous for the reason that it was the point at which groups of caravans divided and proceeded in different directions across the desert, and some of the independent caravans had to pass near the Tuareg nomads.
"None of our slaves," says Daumas, "I am sure, will ever forget this stop, for it was there that they were for the first time given their liberty after being in irons a month. The men and women danced all day after the fashion of their own country, until they fell prostrated with heat and fatigue. Even those whose legs and necks had been made sore from the chains took an active part in this fatiguing exercise, and all came to kiss our hands and to prostrate themselves at our feet and to sprinkle them with sand. We were careful not to interrupt this feast of good augury. It was the first proof to us that they had at last accepted their lot, and we had no longer to fear they would dream of escaping as they were so far from the Sudan and in the very middle of the desert.... From that day all were sincerely attached to us, and our joy was not less than theirs, for the continued watch which had been imposed upon us had been frightfully fatiguing. They helped us to load and unload our camels, to guide them en route, to stretch our tents, and to bring wood and water, labors which we alone had performed for a month. Finally we could lie down and sleep in peace."[13] At an early hour the next morning the tents were folded and the several caravans parted company. One went eastward through Ghat to Ghedames, accompanied as far as Ghat by another whose wares were sold in Fezzan and to other caravans coming from Murzuk. Another went eastward directly to Fezzan, where its merchandise was to be distributed to points in Tunis, Tripoli and Egypt. Daumas and his companion caravan of Tuat struck out to the northwest for the oasis of Tuat.
Two thirds of the camels bought by Daumas in the Sudan died before he reached "Isalab" (Ain Salah?), as they could not stand the hardship of the journey, especially the chilly and damp nights of the desert.