plain.

Descending from thence towards Bambakoo, the travellers pitched their
tents under a tree near that town.

Of the thirty-four soldiers and four carpenters who left the Gambia,
only six soldiers and one carpenter reached the Niger, three having died
during the previous day's march.

As the only canoe Park could obtain would carry but two persons besides
their goods, he and Mr Anderson embarked in it, leaving Mr Martyn and
the men to come down by land with the asses. He himself was suffering
greatly from dysentery. In the evening they landed on some flat rocks
near the shore, and were cooking their supper, when the rain came down,
and continued with great violence all night.

The next day Mr Martyn and the rest of the people overtook them.

On the following day Isaaco, having performed the task he had
undertaken, of guiding them to the Niger, received the payment agreed
on; and Park likewise gave him several articles, and told him that when
the palaver was adjusted at Sego, he should have all the horses and
asses for his trouble.

He here also prepared the present he purposed to offer to Mansong, the
king of Bambarra, and which he sent forward to Sego by Isaaco.

Every day brought them some unfavourable news or other. At one time it
was reported that Mansong had killed Isaaco with his own hand, and
threatened to do the same with all the whites who should come into
Bambarra. These reports proved to be false, for Isaaco himself arrived
in a canoe from Sego, bringing back all the articles sent to Mansong,
who had directed that they should be taken up to Samee, and that he
would send a person to receive them from Park's own hands. Mansong had
promised that the expedition should pass, but whenever Isaaco mentioned
it particularly, or related any incident that had happened on the
journey, Mansong began to make squares and triangles in the sand before
him with his finger, and continued to do so as long as Isaaco spoke
about them. This the superstitious monarch probably did to defend
himself against the supposed incantations of the white man.

On the 22nd of September the chief counsellor of Mansong, Modibinne, and
four grandees, arrived by a canoe, bringing a fat milk-white bullock as
a present. Next morning Modibinne and the grandees came to the camp and
desired Park to acquaint them with the motives which had induced him to
come into their country. Park explained them, telling them that it was
his wish