Beyond this rapid the water was boiling and seething as in some huge caldron; whirlpools and waves met and clashed into each other, and even between the rapids, in comparatively calm water, there was such a swell on that the boats were lifted high up and rolled about as if at sea. We anchored off Garafiri, whilst above and below us roared the rapids. The next day, the 8th, we started early and passed without difficulty the Kandji rapid, which is comparatively easy. We breakfasted at Konotasi; at least, that is the way the natives seem to me to pronounce the name marked Kpatachi on maps. Digui again went to reconnoitre, and came back with the gloomy face of old difficult days. The trading canoes which had left Bussa during our stay there had not yet gone, but were about to discharge their cargoes. They would take a little channel on the right, but it was too narrow for us. Moreover, there was not yet water enough even for native boats, and they would have to wait for an inundation. We must again follow the main stream, and we went along the banks to look for the pass. Malali was nothing to what we had now to encounter, for the only pass was by an opening not as big as that of the sluice of a canal. “Can we pass, Digui?” we asked.—“Yes, perhaps,” he replied, “if it is the will of Allah!” With this assurance we had to be content, and I gave the order “Forward!” When my old guide saw us steering towards the left to take the course impracticable even to native canoes he was terrified. “_Laol alla! Laol alla!_” he cried, “there is no pass there!” I put my hand over his mouth to make him hold his tongue, and flinging himself upon the deck he hid his head in his cloak. I got my camera ready for taking a photograph, but Digui said to me. “It is not worth while!”—“Why?” I asked.—“Because you will not be able to look. You will be afraid!” Yet Digui had seen me look at places still less attractive than this pass, which was no pass. I proved him wrong to some extent, for I did succeed in getting two photographs of the banks we were passing. I don’t deny, however, that I felt a slight shudder pass over me, and I hope I am not more of a coward than any one else would have been under the circumstances. [Illustration: AMONG THE RAPIDS.] This time we experienced a peculiar sensation such as we had never had before; when the boat passed over the whirlpools, everywhere intersecting each other, it seemed to be alternately sucked in and flung out again by the masses of water. One instant of calm, then a second rapid, and we anchored in a little creek; Digui then went back to fetch the _Aube_ and the _Dantec_, and we found ourselves all once more safely together. We had still two more rapids to cross, the first easy, the second more difficult, on account of a very violent current flowing towards a channel on the left encumbered with flints.