me, when a dispute arose between the commercial house of Arbib in
Cairo, and their two partners in El Obeid, Adlan had been nominated
arbitrator by the Cairo house. He had for long remained loyal to the
Government, and had stayed in El Obeid until it fell into the hands of
the Mahdi, who permitted him--as a special favour--to keep 2,000 of the
30,000 dollars he then had.

For a long time Adlan had nothing to do; but he was always an
influential man, and was continually trying to help those in distress.
After the fall of El Obeid, and when all the clerks had been exiled to
various parts, he never ceased until he obtained permission for their
return. A short time before the Mahdi had quitted El Obeid, he had been
employed in the beit el mal, and at Rahad, Wad Suleiman had appointed
him his assistant. He was then despatched by the Mahdi to Berber, to
secure the L60,000 which had been sent to Gordon from Cairo, and which
had been left in the Berber treasury, owing to the interruption of
communications with Khartum. Ibrahim brought the money, clothes, medals,
decorations, and other valuables belonging to Gordon to the Mahdi. The
clothes were sold, and cut to pieces to repair other garments, the metal
of the medals, &c., was melted down, whilst the precious stones were
sold, and eventually found their way to Cairo.

Adlan soon gained considerable influence over the Khalifa, and had
sufficient tact to moderate the inborn tyranny of his master. His desire
to continually give assistance when he could, had made him very popular.
He soon set to work to reorganize the beit el mal, and began by removing
it from its original position to the river bank, thus avoiding the
unnecessary transport of articles brought by boats to the stores.

Here he built an extensive yard of sun-dried bricks, which he divided
off into sections for the various departments of the administration. He
made a large corn-store, in which a mountain of dhurra was
collected--indeed, so high was it, that it could be seen from a
considerable distance. This store was placed in charge of his assistant.
Another yard was built containing a number of rooms, in which the slaves
were kept under a guard of soldiers. Here the slaves were shackled,
twenty or thirty together in one long chain, with iron rings round their
necks. Any obstreperous slaves were generally shackled with one or two
makias or iron rings round their ankles, joined together by a small
chain or iron bar,