filled him with such ardour, as to make him entirely overlook the dangers which awaited him. But the incessant rains, the swelling of the rivers, and the scarcity of provisions, appeared to accumulate obstacles to his further progress. Notwithstanding the liberal offers which he made to various guides, as a fowling-piece to one, one hundred grains of amber to another, a slave to a third, and his horse to a fourth, he could get no one to accompany him. Almany occupied with his army all the roads of Kouranko and of Soliman, where lay the sources of the Niger (and not at Sankara, according to the English maps). His plan, after examining these sources, was to get into Kankan (or the Kong country) in a canoe, and to remain there until the end of the rainy season. He had given orders to Boukari, his faithful Marabou, to go to Bondou or Galam with his cattle and baggage, and there wait for him. When the rainy season was passed, he went to Bourré, to visit the rich gold mines, embarked again upon the Niger, and descended as far as Sego, to obtain information respecting the mouth of that river: chance now put a period to his plans. On his return to Bandéia, he was attacked with fever and dysentery, the effect of the continued rains, and stretched upon a bed of straw for six weeks, awaited every instant a death which seemed almost certain. An inhabitant of the village endeavoured, by the administration of poison, to hasten his exit. The news of his discoveries having reached the ears of several Poulas of the neighbouring villages, means were sought to put him to death, Vol. VIII. No. XLV.

and to carry off his property, particularly his journals. Finding himself in such imminent peril, he rallied his remaining strength, abandoned his wounded horse, and escaped on his ass across the mountains: he was soon, however, overtaken. Several of the chiefs wished to despatch him; others took his part; at last, by means of some presents, he was able to escape this new danger. It is impossible to give an idea of the fatigues he underwent in the midst of the lofty mountains situated to the east of Fouta-Dyallou. Obliged, in spite of the diseases under which he was labouring, to march under a burning sun, and to cross rivers swollen by the rains, he called upon Heaven a thousand times to relieve him by death from the miserable load of existence he was dragging under: he penetrated, however, with the greatest difficulty into TandaMaié, a miserable country, then a prey to famine, where, during three days, he suffered all the horrors of starvation, and could only obtain a little corn by selling the cloak of his Marabou, Boukari.

Arrived on the borders of the Rio Grande, called by the Mandingoes Kabout, he traversed a country certainly more level and richer, but where he again only saved himself from plunder and death by a precipitate flight.

On the 18th of July he reached Geba, the first Portuguese settlement, where he could neither obtain medicines nor any European necessaries. He went on the 3d of August to Bissao, their principal factory. Nothing could exceed. the kindness of the reception which. he met with from the Portuguese

T

service; but, unfortunately, Bissao was equally destitute with Geba of a physician or medicines, and in spite of every attention, his disorder continued to subdue him. At last, on the 1st of November, he returned to Geba; and though he could obtain no horses there, he determined to proceed to the Gambia. On the very day he was to depart, he received intelligence of the arrival of a French schooner at Bissao. He deemed it more prudent to return to a port, than to undertake a new journey by land, the success of which appeared very problematical. On the 7th of January, 1819, he landed at Gorée, and proceeded by land to St. Louis, where he arrived on the 15th of the same month, after a year's absence.

If M. Mollien could not reach the borders of the Niger, certainly it was neither from want of zeal nor courage, but because he got into a road much more difficult than that of Mungo Park, as he undertook to ascend on foot the heights which surround Fouta-Dyallou, and all the countries situated under the same parallels. "The Negroes," said M. Mollien to us, " employ six months to go from Timbou to St. Louis; it requires no more to go from Sego, on the Niger, to this French establishment: this would lead us to suppose, that the distance from these two places to our factory is nearly the same." This conclusion is doubtless rather too strict; something must be deducted on account of the difficulties of the road, perhaps also for the greater windings in a mountainous country; but making all allowances, there are still reasons for thinking,

upon our charts is a great deal too much to the west, or that Sego is placed too much to the east. M. Mollien has also favoured us with some particulars of the countries he has visited.

Cayor is rich in cattle, in horses, but chiefly in honey and cotton. The inhabitants live at their ease, although under the yoke of despotism.

The Yoloffs do not possess so many cattle; but the riches derived from their gum trade, which they abandon to the Moors, from the ebony-trees with which their forests are filled, and from their cotton and honey, which grow in abundance, should engage Europeans to establish a more direct intercourse with this humane and hospitable people.

Of all the countries which M. M. has gone through, Fouta-Toro is indisputably the richest; two harvests yearly enable it to provision many countries, of which it is the granary. Their sheep and oxen, which the people go as far as Fouta-Dyallou to sell, form another source of their riches. Every village cultivates with care an immense quantity of indigo and cotton. The general abundance has rendered the population innumerable; and the industry of the inhabitants deserves the particular attention of travellers, for it indicates that the Poula nation only requires guides to make rapid strides towards civilization: their fanaticism and treachery, however, require the employment of vigorous measures on the part of Europeans, who would find lenient conduct misplaced, in instructing a

I would with pleasure, Mr. Editor, give you a copy of this delectable morceau for the benefit of your readers, but times are now changed; I no longer look upon it with that complaisance I was wont, conceiving it neither superior to Burns nor Byron. In simple truth, it is not a composition bad enough to make your subscribers smile, nor good enough to afford them pleasure. Its parallel may be found in the frequently advertised collections of "Poems by a Lady;" not that I mean to say, that ladies cannot write poetry-I merely allude to those poetics published by clergymen's daughters and officers' widows, where the compliment is paid by the purchaser, not to the abilities, but to the pecuniary wants of the writer.

However, I immediately sent off another production to the same magazine, fully satisfied that its editor would gladly receive it; intending afterwards to collect all my divine breathings into one volume, to be tastefully done up on hot-pressed paper, with a plentiful embankment of margin.

I now began to give myself some few airs, looked upon linen-drapers and counting-house clerks with no little contempt, and waited with less but very little less-impatience than formerly the approaching month it came and fled-but Tristram Gilliflower and the Female Suppliant were unnoticed. I immediately penned a remonstrance; when, after another long month,

our publication: we recommend him to read more and write less." A third, notwithstanding, followed; but I found, at length, that my first production had probably found its way into print, not because it possessed sufficient merit, but as an amende honorable for the detention of its unfortunate author. I was stung to the quick at this reflection; I dared not even inform my friend Randal of it. This, however, saved my wine; but my Muse lay fallow for some months, till at length she was delivered in plain prose, and brought forth an Essay on the Poetic Character, written in the manner of Goldsmith - at least so I ventured to imagine.

This was indeed all my own; for Randal, soon after I had written the rough draught,had run in debt, and also run away: consequently I was left to myself; but not, like Moliere or Swift, having an old woman, or a cook-maid, on whom to try the merits of my productions, I referred mine to my landlady's niece, who never failed to please me by the justness of her criticisms in applauding all I wrote.

I now destroyed many a quire of paper, whose undigested contents went off, post or otherwise, to several periodical publications, and were inserted or rejected as caprice, convenience, or the idleness of their editors permitted. These gentlemen, indeed, exerted their whole stock of editorial wit upon me: sometimes I was too hot, sometimes too cold; sometimes ordered to school-and well indeed did I think myself off, if they only lash