4i6 THE EXPLORATION OF THE NIGER onions, potatoes, and kons (large edible roots), chickens and eggs, were sold to us by native women. Our guide and the nephew of the chief of Tenda meanwhile went to a big village further inland, and about two o'clock returned, accompanied by the son of its chief, who sent us word that he was too old to come and see us by the bad roads between his home and our camp, but his son would represent him, unless, indeed, we ourselves would visit him. W'e did not see why we should not, so I started with Taburet, Suleyman, Tierno, and Mame.

The chief was quite right about the road. It certainly was not good, for it led us, to begin with, across an inundated plain, where we were up to our knees in water for about a mile. It was also oppressively hot, and the upper part of our bodies was as wet with perspiration as our legs were with the mud of the marsh. It was with a sigh of relief that we came to the rising ground where the road was better, except for the steep and rough bit strewn with sharp flints. We had this kind of thing for some four miles, and Taburet, who was toiling along beside me, became the colour of a ripe cherry. Was this colour a favourite one in these parts, I wondered ? Anyhow our doctor made a deep impression on the heart of one of the beauties of Tenda, who had come to see us in our boats, and walked with us to the chiefs village. It was a regular case of love at first sight, for she never took her eyes off Taburet, offering him flowers and pea-nuts, and moving the flints out of his way. It was a real idyll.

I felt pretty sure of the doctor's power of resisting the blandishments of the syren, but still I thought it was as well to remind him of the negro eunuchs, who, if he did lapse from virtue, would be pretty sure to sew him up in an ox-hide, and fling him into what answered here to the Bosphorus. We arrived at Tenda laughing merrily,