A rather disagreeable incident now occurred. The Zoghorán officer, the companion of Férreji, had come out on some errand, while I was staying with the three brothers in the large tent, which had been erected for Sídi Mohammed. I wanted to leave, but Bakáy begged me to stay. I therefore remained a short time, but became so disgusted with the insulting language of the Zoghorán, that I soon left abruptly, although his remarks had more direct reference to the French, or, rather, the French and half-caste traders on the Senegal, than to the English or any other European nation. He spoke of the Christians in the most contemptuous manner, describing them as sitting like women in the bottom of their steamboats, and doing nothing but eating raw eggs: concluding with the paradoxical statement, which is not very flattering to Europeans, that the idolatrous Bámbara were far better people, and much farther advanced in civilisation than the Christians. It is singular how the idea that the Europeans are fond of raw eggs (a most disgusting article to a Mahommedan), as already proved by the experience of Mungo Park, has spread over the whole of Negroland, and it can only be partially explained by the great predilection which the French have for boiled eggs. Altogether my situation required an extraordinary amount of forbearance, for Álawáte also troubled me again with his begging propensities. But when he came himself to take leave of me, I told him that the time for presents was now past; whereupon he said, that he was aware that if I wanted to give I gave, meaning that it was only the want of goodwill that made me not comply with his wish. I assured him that I had given him a great many presents against my own inclination. He owned that he had driven a rather hard bargain with me, but, when he wanted me to acknowledge at least that he had done me no personal harm, I told him that the reason was rather his want of power than his want of inclination, and that, although I had nothing to object to him in other respects, I should not like to trust myself in his hands alone in the wilderness.