“Why do you tell us that, Osman?” I asked. “I feel sure you have some very good reason, but take care what you say. You are lying, I know. Amadu is really trying to pick a quarrel with us.” “_Bissimilaye!_ not a bit of it,” was the reply. “He is only getting his column together to move against Djermakoy.” I had never been told a word about that expedition, and the fact seemed strange, so I said— “Osman! you are telling a lie. What column is going against Djermakoy?” Then with much hesitation, and turning as pale as a negro can when he has got himself into a hobble, he began to tell us how all the people of Say, and the Toucouleurs, in fact, all the natives, had united to march on Dentchendu, a big village of Djerma, the very centre of the Futanké agitation, but that before actually starting they were all coming to Say to receive the benediction of Saturu, who would recite the Fatiha to the glory of the Prophet on the tomb of his ancestor, Mohammed Djebbo, who had founded the town. [Illustration: FORT ARCHINARD.] I understood at once, and really the plan to surprise us had not been at all badly thought out. “Well, Osman,” I said, “you will warn Modido that if the Toucouleur column camps in or near his village, in which he declined to receive us, it will mean war with us.” “Oh!” cried Osman in his dismay, “the whole column will not come, only the chiefs, with Ahmidu Ahmadu, the leader of the troops.” Then he tried to undo what he had done, and told quite a different story, saying he had been mistaken; Saturu would go and give the benediction to the column on the bank near Djerma. We were warned now; a big column really was assembled. We made discreet inquiries on every side, and all the news we heard confirmed the fact. Pullo himself now ventured to be explicit, and told us to be on our guard. The palm of deception and treason must be given in this case to a Fulah from Massina, called Ahmadu Mumi, but we were the ones to reap the benefit of his evil-doing. Born in the village of Mumi, near Mopti, on the Niger, all his people had been killed by the Toucouleurs when El Hadj Omar won his great victory. He himself had been taken prisoner, and dragged behind the horses of his captors to Say, where, bruised, bleeding, and in rags, he was sold. Of course, as a natural consequence, he hated the Toucouleurs with an intense and bitter hatred, but he was later bought by the chief of Say, who set him free. He became the confidant and friend of his liberator, so that, as he explained to us, he knew better than any one else what was going on, and was therefore better able to betray Saturu.