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Having received his final instructions from the African Association, he set sail from Portsmouth on the 22d of May, 1795, on board the Endeavour, an African trader, bound for the Gambia, where he arrived on the 21st of the following month.
But he would now mention one or two instances of another sort, and these merely on account of the conclusion, which was to be drawn from them. When Captain Hills was in the river Gambia, he mentioned accidentally to a Black pilot, who was in the boat with him, that he wanted a cabin-boy. It so happened that some youths were then on the shore with vegetables to sell.
The Fulis principal settlement is on both sides of the Senegal; great numbers of these people are also mixed with the Mandingos; which last are mostly settled on both sides the Gambia. The government of the Jalofs is represented as under a better regulation than can be expected from the common opinion we entertain of the Negroes.
Unable to go by way of Woolli, he decided in favour of the Fouta Toro route, and in spite of the jealousy of the natives and their love of pillage, he reached Bondou without accident. It took him three days to traverse the desert between Bondou and the districts beyond the Gambia, after which he penetrated into Niokolo, a mountainous country, inhabited by the all but wild Peuls and Djallons.
Beginning at the river Senegal, situate about the 17th degree of North latitude, being the nearest part of Guinea, as well to Europe as to North America; from thence to the river Gambia, and in a southerly course to Cape Sierra Leona, comprehends a coast of about seven hundred miles; being the same tract for which Queen Elizabeth granted charters to the first traders to that coast: from Sierra Leona, the land of Guinea takes a turn to the eastward, extending that course about fifteen hundred miles, including those several civilians known by name of the Grain Coast, the Ivory Coast, the Gold Coast, and the Slave Coast, with the large kingdom of Benin.
Halted during the heat of the day at Mambari, where there is a small village built this season; the former one having been destroyed by war many years ago. Passed in the course of the forenoon two streams running towards Gambia. " Obser. Mer. Alt. 162 43 0 1/2 81 21 30 0 16 0 81 37 30 Z.D. 8 23 30 D. 21 46 10 Latitude 13 22 40
It must be somewhat galling to the good folk of Rhio, to see some hundreds of vessels of all descriptions under the Dutch flag sail past their harbour every year, bound for Singapore, where they transact business to a large amount; favouring this port, probably, with a short visit on their return, for the purpose of purchasing a few hundred peculs of gambia for the Java market.
A score of years ago it was garrisoned by some 300 men of the West African Corps. Now it is reduced to 100 armed policemen: the Gambia militia, composed of the Combo and Macarthy's Island forces, is never called out. The population of the twenty-one square miles is given by Whittaker for 1881 as 14,150, including 105 whites.
By that you will see that I have had but little time to attend to objects of natural history; but lest you should think that I have neglected this pursuit entirely, I have sent a few specimens in a trunk, which I hope will come safe; the most remarkable are, "1st. The Fang jani, or self-burning tree of Gambia.
But no account was ever received of his journey. Park in his first expedition reached Silla, in long. 1 degree 34 minutes west, a distance of 1100 miles from the mouth of the Gambia.
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