TRAVELS IN AFRICA. 251 me go so easily) were concerting measures for my release and that of the men with me, but these were now rendered unnecessary.

On the following morning I gave to the men who accompanied me as guides, half a piece of baft each, and in fulfilment of my promise, delivered to them for Bayla, a present, amounting to fifty bars or thereabouts. They were thankful for the former, and seemed surprised on receiving the latter, for they decidedly thought I should decline giving any thing, at least, so considerable as what I had done, when once removed from the power of their master.

The men since their arrival at Baquelle had been encamped on the north bank of the river, and had commenced forming huts on that side ; but I found the situation so low, and liable to inundation during the rains which had then so completely set in that the river had risen some feet, that I took up another and better position on the south bank, on a rock, elevated about sixty feet above the river, and surrounded partly by the then unfinished walls of the French fort, and partly by the half demolished ones of a part of the town of Baquelle, which formerly stood there. In taking up this position I was also influenced by a report which was in circulation that Almamy Bondoo had privately assembled a large force at Conghel, for