About midnight the dooty with some of his people opened the gate, and desired me to come in. They were convinced, they said, I was not a Moor; for no Moor ever waited any time at the gate of a village without cursing the inhabitants.” The history of this journey now becomes nothing more than a repetition of similar sufferings. Hunger, fatigue, and depression of spirits attack the traveller by turns. Nothing, however, subdues his courage. Obstacle after obstacle yields to his persevering intrepidity, and he pushes forward with invincible ardour towards the coast. In one place, at the request of a native who had grown opulent by industrious application to commerce, he wrote charms for a good supper; and, finding the contrivance productive, continued the practice next day for small presents of various kinds. On other occasions, where superstition did not come to his aid, humanity interposed, and snatched him from starvation. At Bammakoo he was hospitably treated, even by a Moor, who, having travelled to Rio Grande, had conversed with Christians, and conceived a favourable idea of their character. The rains had now increased the Niger to a vast size, and rendered impassable almost every road; but, as our traveller’s finances had long been exhausted, he found himself compelled to proceed, the charity of the natives not extending so far as to the maintaining of a stranger for several months. The ordinary roads being obstructed by the rains, the only practicable route, wild, dreary, and desolate, lay over steril rocky mountains, over which, it was feared, a horse could not pass.