Dr. Barth was told by the governor—who had the manners of a Jew, but was evidently born of a slave-mother—that he should welcome with joy a European vessel bringing to the town the many articles its inhabitants needed. He was astonished to find that the traveller was not a trader; and believing that only some very powerful motive could induce any man to undertake such an expedition, he grew alarmed at the possibility of treacherous and insidious designs, and requested him to leave the place. Dr. Barth was by no means unwilling, and on the following day left behind him the Niger, which separates the explored regions of Negroland from the unexplored, and eagerly directed his course towards the mysterious zone which stretched before him. He had crossed the low swampy island occupied by the town of Say, and the western branch of the river, at that season entirely dry, when a great storm of thunder and rain broke upon him, and his progress was arrested by the rolling clouds of sand which the wind accumulated in his path. After a halt of three hours his march was resumed, though the soil was flooded with water to a depth of several inches. The country through which he passed had been colonized by the Sourays; it is a dependency of the province of Guinea, and the natives were at war both with the colonists and the Fulbi. Thence he entered a well-cultivated district, where the Fulbi, who regard the cow as the most useful member of the animal world, breed large herds of cattle. The scenery was varied by thickets of mimosas, with here and there a baobab or a tamarisk. More attractive to the traveller, because more novel, were the numerous furnaces, six or seven feet high, used for casting iron. The ground broke up into great irregularities; ridges of rock ran in all directions; formations of gneiss and mica schist predominated, with rare and beautiful varieties of granite. There, through banks of twenty feet in height, picturesque and rocky, flowed the deep waters of the Sirba. To effect the passage, Dr. Barth’s followers could obtain only some bundles of reeds; the chief and all the inhabitants of the village sitting calmly on the bank, and watching their operations with lively interest. The men had expressive countenances, with effeminate features; long plaited hair, which fell upon the shoulders; a pipe in their mouths; and, for attire, a blue shirt and wide blue trousers. The women were dumpy and ill proportioned; they wore numerous collars, and pearls in their ears; their bosom and legs were naked.