The treaty which I had at length succeeded in getting signed by the sheikh of Bórnu and his vizier on the last of August, together with a map of all the parts of Central Africa which I had as yet visited, and containing at the same time all the information which I had been able to collect concerning the neighbouring provinces[1], I had forwarded home in the middle of October, addressing at the same time the request to H.M.’s consul at Tripoli, to send me, by a special courier to Zínder, a certain sum of money. The road which I had before me was long, leading through the territories of a great many different chiefs, and partly even of powerful princes; and as soon as I should have left Zínder behind me, I could not expect to find fresh supplies, the sum of money which I had received on my return from Bagírmi being almost all spent in paying the debts which we had incurred when left without means. A sum of 400 dollars, besides a box containing choice English ironware, had been some time before consigned to a Tebú of the name of Áhmed Háj ʿAlí Bíllama: but instead of proceeding at once with the caravan with which he had left Fezzán, as he ought to have done, he staid behind in his native town Bilma to celebrate a marriage. The caravan, with about twenty horses and a hundred camels, arrived, on the 10th of November, without bringing me anything, except the proof of such reckless conduct; and as I could not afford to lose any more time in waiting for this parcel, I left orders that it should be forwarded to Zínder as soon as it should arrive. But never received it. Nearly three fourths of the money in cash which we had received being required to pay off our debts, we had been obliged to give away a great portion even of the articles of merchandise, or presents, in order to reward friends who for so long a period had displayed their hospitality towards us, and rendered us services almost without the slightest recompense; so that, on the whole, it was only under the most pressing circumstances I could think of undertaking a journey to the west with the means then at my disposal. But, very luckily, a handsome sum of money was on the road to Zínder; I also expected to receive at that place a few new instruments, as the greater part of my thermometers were broken, and I had no instrument left for making hypsometrical observations.