394 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1942 



white men were enrolled, but illness reduced the average number at 

 work to about a hundred. When 300 meters long, the pier reached 

 water only 5-6 meters deep. Coaling still had to be done by lighter, 

 and the Messageries Maritimes continued to use St. Vincent, Cape 

 Verde Islands, as its port of call. A second jetty, running north- 

 northeast from the extremity of Dakar Point, reached a depth of 10 

 meters at 330 meters and withstood the storms of the rainy season of 

 1866. The port of call was then transferred to Dakar, and the shipping 

 company built a house near its quay for its representative, who was 

 expected to put up official and other distinguished travelers during 

 the 24 hours their boat remained in port for coaling. Although shelter 

 from the northeast was still inadequate, the harbor received little 

 further alteration for another generation. 



By the time the jetty was finished, the Cape had been supplied with 

 suitable lights, and shipwrecks decreased. A lighthouse to mark the 

 Cape was built on the western, higher Mamelle, supplemented by a 

 beacon on the outermost of the reef like islands off Almadies Point. 



The official town plan was dictated by considerations of health and 

 commerce.^^ The site was studded with low dunes, from which a small 

 amount of potable water could be obtained ; cisterns were also used. 

 A cemetery (much in demand on this unhealthful coast) was begun 

 well away from the habitations. The gridiron pattern usual in 

 French colonial foundations was adopted, with orientation to compass 

 directions, to take advantage of the alternately north and south preva- 

 lent breezes. Its south edge was a street made broad for sanitary 

 reasons, punctuated midway by a plaza intended for the church. Land 

 facing the plaza was reserved for administration buildings. Be- 

 yond the wide street stood the military quarters, an extension of the 

 battery on Dakar Point. (Fig. 3.) 



The water front made a shallow S. Behind it the ground rose 

 irregularly to a plain. A belt 81 meters wide along the shore, on 

 which no new construction was permitted, was reserved for public 

 use. Conveniently central to the civil and military establishments 

 and to the port was the market place. 



With the change of a few street names, this layout has become the 

 core of the later city. At first population grew slowly. Superiority 

 of the port to that of bar-choked Saint-Louis led a private company 

 to build a railroad connecting the two, opened in 1885. Its terminus 

 was on the harbor side, at the north base of the high ground where the 

 early town stood. It stirred the stagnant town to its first real anima- 

 tion. Gum arabic and other light produce of the Senegal River area 

 came in to take advantage of the regular sailings. A few peanuts 



15 Pinet-Laprade (founder of the city and originator of the plan) to the Governor of 

 Senegal, Aug. 24, 1859. Quoted in Faure, op. cit., pp. 146 fif. 



