Not only flies, but other species of insects also, became now exceedingly abundant in this desert tract, after it had been inundated and fertilised by the waters of the river; and a countless number of caterpillars especially became very troublesome, creeping about the ground, and getting upon the carpets and mats and every other article. While thus the inconvenience of the open camp was manifold, my amusements were rather limited, and even my food was poorer than it had been before. The famous “rejíre” had been supplanted, from want of cheese, by the less tasteful “dakno,” seasoned, in the absence of honey, with the fruit of the baobab or monkey-bread tree. In the morning, however, it afforded me some amusement to observe the daughters of the Ígelád driving out to the pasture grounds their parents’ asses, and to witness the various incidents in the daily life of these people. But they were soon to leave, as well as the Kél-úlli, both tribes returning to their quarters further eastward. All my friends, with whom I had had only so short an acquaintance, thus taking leave of me, I was extremely glad when a brother of Mohammed ben ʿAbd-Alláhi came out of the town and paid me a visit. It was from this man, whose name was Dáúd, that I obtained a great deal of important information with respect to the quarter north of the river, between Hamda-Alláhi and Bághena. I also met here another person, who gave me a curious piece of information with regard to the Rás el Má, the great north-westerly creek of the river, which I have already mentioned repeatedly, and of which I shall say more in the Appendix[23], although I was not enabled to understand its whole purport. In reference to that basin, he said, that, when the waters had decreased very considerably, a bubbling was observed at the bottom of the basin; but whether this referred to sources of living water, or to some other phenomenon, I could not make out distinctly, although I imagine the former to be the case. [Sidenote: March 21st.] This was a very important day in various respects. First, it was highly remarkable for its atmospheric character, as beginning the “nisán,” that is to say, the short rainy season of spring. This peculiar season I had not observed in the other more southerly parts of Negroland which I had visited, but it is also observed in other tropical regions, especially in Bengal, although that country is certainly placed under different conditions, and reaches farther northward. We had two regular falls of rain this day, although of no great abundance, this phenomenon being repeated for about seven days, though not in succession. Meanwhile the flies became quite insupportable, and almost drove me to despair.