In the beginning of this my journey to the west, I had been very anxious to move on as fast as possible, in order to avoid the worst part of the rainy season; but seeing that all was in vain, I had become, in a certain degree, indifferent to the loss of time; but when the first of August broke upon me in this village, I became deeply concerned, and wrote in my journal: “May the Almighty bless this month, and lighten the difficulties which stand in my way, that before its close I may safely reach the place of my destination!” It was most interesting to observe from the top of the hill the uninterrupted sheet of water, which, after the immense quantity of rain that had fallen, was spreading out over the low grounds in the plain; and the people themselves whose dwellings had suffered so much, and which were just about to undergo the necessary repairs, were standing gazing with delight upon the deluge which promised to them a very rich crop. My clever Arab from the west lay almost dead with fever; but the head man of the town, whose name was Ábu-Bakr, a man of very stately appearance, was of rather a communicative disposition, so that with his assistance I was able to make considerable progress in my knowledge of the Songhay language; and, if I had been able to go on in this way, I might soon have mastered the language; but unfortunately my situation became too unsettled in the sequel to allow of a quiet course of study; to say nothing of the fact, that the extremely poor character of the language itself completely damped my enthusiasm. I here first discovered the error of Caillié in giving to the people of Timbúktu the name of “Kissúr,” or, as he writes, “Kissour,” which is evidently nothing but a mistake, “ki-sóʿri,” or rather “ki-songhi,” “ki- songhay,” meaning the language of the Songhay. I here also became aware of the fact that this idiom is originally monosyllabic, while I observed likewise that the language spoken in Ágades, of which I had made a vocabulary, though evidently a dialect of the same idiom, had been affected to a great extent by the influence of the Temáshight, or Berber. [Sidenote: Tuesday, August 2nd.] We at length set out to pursue our journey, which now became full of danger, as we had to traverse the province of Dalla, which is ruled by a governor in direct subjection to the fanatical chief of Másina residing in Hamda-Alláhi, who would never allow a Christian to visit his territory. I was therefore obliged to assume the character of an Arab. Just at that time a change in the government of this district had taken place,—a young inexperienced lad having succeeded to the former ruler.