92 TRAVELS IN AFRICA.

but because the people would not allow us to approach the wells, alleging that it was their property, and we must pay for it as well as for the other commodities of life. Remonstrance, and an inclination to force on our part, together with the interference of our guides, at length obtained it ; not, however, before it was much wanted.

We left that inhospitable village at three, p.

M., the same day, and travelled in the same direction over a very finely diversified country, for two hours, when we arrived at a small village called Kussaye, or Metofodia Cunda, having passed, about two miles before it, the ruins of a very large walled town, called Maja Cunda.

This was formerly the residence of Modiba, the man who assisted us at Woolli, but was destroyed and abandoned by him, in consequence of the surrounding soil not producing good crops ; it is very light and sandy, and mixed with lumps of a stiff white clay, having much the appearance of pipe-clay.

The occurrences at Madina, the hurry at leaving it, and the very great want of means of conveyance which we experienced, together with the confused state of the baggage in consequence of such want, and the indisposition of some of the men, induced us to determine on halting here for a day, in order to set all things