Our march for the first mile and a half led through stubble fields, after which we entered a dense forest filled with numerous creeping plants, but otherwise of a rather uniform character; awaiting the reviving power of the rainy season. The shallow watercourse Mbusáda, or Msél el Háj ʿAlí, was all the time close on our left, till we crossed it, at a distance of about five miles. We then pursued our march through cultivated grounds, where, besides millet, a little cotton also was raised, at other times proceeding through clearer forest, and soon reached the village Mustafají, which was the native place of the wife of my escort Gréma ʿAbdú. Here we were quartered without delay; but the huts were not remarkable either for their size or architecture, consisting entirely of thatch and reed, the lower part being only slightly touched with clay, and during the hot hours of the day the heat of them was really suffocating. The inhabitants are all Kanúri, who, having emigrated from Bórnu during the time of the decay of that empire, have settled here as well as in other parts of Bagírmi, where they have introduced the little civilization which at present is seen, especially weaving and dyeing, which is here carried on to a considerable extent. The Shárí or Bá, in a direct line, is only about seven miles distant towards the west, and the inundation even approaches the very village by means of the shallow depressions and watercourses which intersect the country. A great extent of ground was under cultivation. The inhabitants of the village behaved very hospitably, and my horseman’s father-in-law, a very jovial and decent looking man, made me a present of a fat sheep. The only difficulty was the water, the well, notwithstanding its depth of fifteen fathoms, containing only a very small supply. Scarcity of water seems, indeed, to be one of the great disadvantages of Bagírmi. We remained here the whole of the forenoon of the following day, and did not start until half-past two in the afternoon. The country which we traversed was well inhabited, and a good deal of cotton was to be seen; and it was here that I first beheld it cultivated in ridges and furrows, a manner of culture which, I think, is constantly adhered to in America as well as in India, but in Negroland very rarely; the cotton plants growing on the ridges, but being at present quite bare of leaves. All the cotton plantations which I had seen previously in Negroland were left to themselves, and were rather in a wild state; but here they seemed to be well kept and taken care of. At a village called Mútkomí my attention was drawn to the great numbers of asses; here the ground was full of the holes of the fének or _Megalotis_, called by the native Shúwa population “bú hassén.”