The town of Zindu is protected by a rampart and ditch. Its aspect is remarkable: a mass of rock rises in the western quarter; and outside the walls stony ridges run in all directions, throwing forth a myriad crystal streams, which fertilize the tobacco-fields, and secure for the immediate neighbourhood an exceptional fertility. The landscape is enlivened by frequent clumps of date-palms and by the huts of the Touaregs, who conduct a brisk trade in salt. To the south extends an immense piece of ground, utilized, at the time of Dr. Barth’s visit, as a garden of acclimatization. It is easy, let us say, to define the ground-plan of Zindu, but not to depict the stir and movement of which it is the centre, limited as that activity may be, compared with the feverish and far-reaching life of the industrial centres of Europe. Zindu has no other manufacture than that of indigo; nevertheless, its commercial energy is so great that it may justly be termed “the port of the Soudan.” Here Dr. Barth received the welcome supply of a thousand dollars, which, not to excite suspicion, had been carefully concealed in a couple of sugar barrels. He was enabled, therefore, to purchase the articles necessary for barter or gifts in his expedition to Timbúktu, such as red, white, and yellow burnouses, turbans, cloves, cutlery, beads, and looking-glasses; and on the 30th of January, 1853, he resumed his march. The country he had to traverse was the scene of incessant warfare between the Fulbi and the independent tribes. At the outset he met with some salt merchants from A’ir, whose picturesque encampments would have delighted an artist’s eye, but did not add to the security of the roads. He arrived in safety, however, on the 5th of February, at Kátséna, and took up his quarters in a residence specially assigned to him. The house was spacious; but so full of ants, that, having rested himself for an hour on a bank of clay, he found that the freebooters had climbed the wall, constructed covered galleries right up to his person, and delivered a combined attack upon his shirt, in which they had eaten large holes.