Wearied by their importunity, I sometimes left them in an ill humour, and went to lie down. They then cried out “He is a christian! See how he behaves to us! He has medicine, and will not give any to us Musulmans.” In these dilemmas, I was always much indebted to Ibrahim, who told his countrymen that I had been brought up among christians, and had learned their manners. But they constantly renewed their entreaties, and, in the end, succeeded in getting what they wanted. During the whole period of my residence at Cambaya, I was teazed in this way by the inhabitants, who were not satisfied with obtaining my medicines for nothing, but also expected tobacco, scissors, and Guinea cloth, to make coussabes. Several children used to come into the yard and ask me to dress their sores. At length, after innumerable importunities of this kind, which I omit to mention, these Mandingoes, more selfish and ignorant than deliberately wicked, began to accommodate themselves to my character, and ceased to regard me as a white. In fact, they never could conceive it possible that a European should undertake so long a journey on foot, and alone, merely from philanthropic motives. As they live in a state of ignorance and simplicity, similar to that of our first parents, unacquainted with wealth and luxury, the existence of learned societies in Europe, formed for the purpose of meliorating their condition and extending to them the advantages of knowledge and all the benefits of civilization, is to them a thing quite incomprehensible. Ibrahim was not more sagacious than the other negroes. He did not solicit me directly, but pretended that he wished to purchase every thing; he coveted in particular, my baggage. He had brought a quantity of Guinea cloth and tobacco from Kakondy, but that did not prevent him from continually proposing to buy what I had. He alleged that my Guinea cloth was finer than his, and that the flavour of my tobacco was superior, though they were both of precisely the same quality. Sometimes he hinted to me that he was without trowsers, or that his coussabe was quite worn out; and in this way he suggested the necessity of purchasing what he wanted from me, in the hope that I should make him a present of it. While we were at Popoco, he took a fancy to a fine piece of muslin, which served me for a turban. He begged that I would sell it to him when we arrived at his village. I made him a present of it, and in return, he overwhelmed me with endless thanks. I shall here relate an anecdote relative to my character of physician, which the Mandingoes made me assume in spite of myself.