FROM FAFA TO SAY 285 have had our historic enemies the Toucouleurs think I was afraid of them. The tone I took up too gave us an ascendency later which we sorely needed.

After going about twenty-two miles further down the river, we anchored near enough to Say to make out the trees surrounding it, and the next day we reached the town itself, which had for so long been the object of our desires.

Say is a comparatively big place, but not nearly as important as it is often made out to be. It is made up of straw huts with pointed roofs, and is surrounded by palisades also of straw. Only one house is built of mud, and that forms the entrance sacred to the chief The river flows on the east of the town, and on the west is a low-lying tract of what are meadows in the dry season, but mere swamps in the winter.

We anchored at once, but the stench from the rubbish on the banks of the river was so great that we soon moved to the southern extremity of the village, where the shore was cleaner.

Our passengers meanwhile had gone to announce our arrival, and old Abdu, who is in command of the prisoners of the chief of Say, soon came to see us. Baud and Vermesch had had some dealings with him, and had spoken well of him to us, while Monteil also alludes to him. He seemed a very worthy sort of fellow.

After the customary exchange of compliments, I asked to be permitted to pay a visit to his master, Amadu Saturu, generally known under the name of Modibo, or the savant, and Abdu went off" to make my request known at once, but we waited and waited a very long time before any answer was vouchsafed.

We were simply consumed with impatience, and I augured ill from the delay. I remembered of course that