INTERCOURSE WITH AFRICA. '265 they are perfidious ; but they give no proof of it that I have seen. I have met with a French traveller, wlio owns that his countrymen deceive them either in the weight or measure of the gum they purchase.

Bruce found a friend in every Moorish merchant, and integrity and intelligence in all. And where should these qualities be found in a country like the interior of Africa, in which learning has no place but among merchants ?

So much for the proposed carriers of English goods to Timbuctoo. Now for the road. The fertile parts of Africa are hot and humid, unwholesome and dangerous; and the kings are often at war with each other. Park experienced both these evils ; and the wonder was, not so much that he perished on his second journey, as that he returned from his first. The Desert is dry and heathful. It is sprinkled with fertile spots, which form a succession of known restingplaces, and the distance between each requires a certain number of days to travel. The Moors are at home in Sahara ; and, when they go long journeys, the fertile spots are their inns. The road from the coast of Sahara is also the shortest that has yet been pointed out to Timbuctoo.

If the means of executing the plan appear sufficient, it is not necessary to say any thing in favour of the object : the exchange of British manufactures for gold, speaks for itself. But there is no time to be lost. The French settlement of Galam is advantageously situated for commerce with Timbuctoo: a Frenchman has