Wassoulo. — Manners and customs of the inhabitants. — Flourishing state of agricultural industry. — Hospitality. — Kankary. — Sambatikila. — Reflections on the sale of slaves. — Scarcity. — Description of the residence of the almamy. — Commerce. — Smiths’ work. — Bambara villages. — Arrival at Timé. — Ranges of mountains. Wassoulo is a country inhabited by idolatrous Foulahs, who are herdsmen and agriculturists; they rear a great number of horned cattle, and some sheep, and goats. I have seen among them horses of a small breed, and incapable of supporting much fatigue. They have also poultry, on which they set a high value, and which can only be bought for gunpowder, tobacco, salt, or glass-wares. They take especial care of their young fowls, collecting them every night in a sort of round basket, and carrying them into their huts to protect them from cold, and soon after sun-rise every morning, they are again set at liberty to run about round the house; they are seldom fed with grain of any kind, but live upon insects, herbs, and the grains of rice or millet, which fly out of the mortars while pounding. The men take care of the poultry, and bring out of the fields heaps of earth swarming with termites, which the fowls immediately devour. All the inhabitants have dogs to protect their houses; but I did not see dogs’ flesh eaten in Wassoulo, as in some parts of Bambara. The country is generally open, and diversified by a few hills; the soil very fertile, and partly composed of a rich black mould mixed with gravel: the country is watered by the Sarano, and by many large streams, which fertilise the soil; it brings forth in abundance every thing which is necessary for man in an unsophisticated state. The inhabitants are gentle, humane, and very hospitable, curious to excess, but much less teazing than the Mandingoes. Their food is very simple; they eat, like the people of Kankan, rice, tau, foigné, without pounding; to these they add a sauce made of leaves of different herbs, or of roasted pistachio-nuts. They seldom use salt, which is a great luxury, and eat meat only on feast-days; in their sauces they mix (besides gombo) the leaf of the baobab, dried and pounded; they also eat the fruit of this tree, which they steep in water or milk, and which, like nédé, is very sweet and nutritious.