144 FORESTRY OF WEST AFRICA. 



compete with the Gold Coast and Lagos in the 

 matter of cultivation and export trade in this article. 

 If it will pay to buy and ship cotton to European 

 markets from ports thousands of miles further off, it 

 would surelypay to do the same from those Possessions. 

 From the Gambia and Sierra Leone there has been 

 no export worthy of separate mention in the raw 

 material ; but I must not omit to mention that behind 

 the latter and up the Gambia River proceeds an im- 

 portant and extensive manufacture of the cotton of 

 the country, in the shape of rich country cloths, fine 

 specimens of which were seen in the Colonial and 

 Indian Exhibition. The currency of the River Gambia 

 is also represented in this manufacture. I may here 

 add that in the year, viz. 1885, when I left those 

 Settlements there were, in the mercantile houses of 

 Bathurst, country cloths of currency to the value of 

 over ;£'6o,ooo. Such an exceptionally large stock was 

 due to the failures of the crops in ground nuts, and to 

 the unsettled state of the country consequent on the 

 Baddiboo and other wars prevailing. 



Superior cloths, on indigo-dyed cotton foundation, 

 of various and quaint patterns in silk and wool, are 

 also made by the Volofs, who have learnt the art from 

 the Moors. 



This Gambian industry admitted, in addition to 

 supply for home consumption, of an export in pagns 

 to the value of .^480 in 1883, and of ^^2,742 in 1884. 



Again, in such manufactures, a considerable native 



