THE PIGMIES. 95 



unable, for want of proper instruments, to determine the exact 

 position of Mount Temli from which the Niger (^flowe, and although 

 they were only allowed to look at it at a distance, owing to local 

 superstition, yet we can see by their map, published, by the 

 G-eographical Society of Marseilles, that the mount is situated 

 about 8° 35' north latitude and 12° 45' west longitude. 



The river, at first a mere brook, runs from north to south, but 

 soon takes a general direction from south-west to north-east, which 

 it maintains as far as Timbuctoo, just beyond the 18th degree. ( 2 ) 

 At this point it takes a sharp bend to the east as far as Bourroum ( 3 ) 

 for an extent of more than three degrees of longitude, when it turns 

 off to the S. S.'W". and runs into the Gulf of Guinea. It must con- 

 sequently be between the first and second degree west longitude 

 that the Nasamons reached the Niger. It is impossible to point out 

 with greater precision the position of the town inhabited by negroes 

 to which the bold travellers, were conducted ; at all events, we 

 feel perfectly certain that they could not mean the famous Tim- 

 buctoo, the foundation of which only dates from the fifth 

 century of the Hegira (1100 a. d.), according to Ahmed-Baba, 

 the historian of that country. ( 4 ) 



Heeodottjs informs us that the young Nasamons saw crocodiles 

 in the river they visited, and this again is perfectly accurate, 

 more so even than might be expected at first. A priori, it might 

 be supposed, not without plausible reasons, that the large reptiles 



allowed to stand at a spot called Foria and gaze, at a distance, on the sacred 

 mountain and the brook which rises from it. Expedition C. H. Vermink. Vo- 

 yage aux Sources du Niger par Z. Ziveifel et M. Atoustier, 1879. ( Bulletin de 

 la Societe de Geographic dc Marseille, 1880, p. 129 J 



(i ) M. Rabaud, President of the Geographical Society of Marseilles, in his 

 report on this remarkable expedition, remarks very rightly that this want of 

 instruments is not really to be regretted. Superstition is so strong in the 

 country visited by the two Marseilles travellers, that the use of a field-glass 

 alone was sufficient to cause threatening demonstrations on the part of the 

 natives, and they had to give up using it. They would certainly have been mas- 

 sacred had they been caught in the act of making astronomical observations. 



(2) ISo 3' 45" latitude and 4 o 5' 10" west longitude. Annuairc du Bureau 

 des Longitutes, 1877, p. 310. 



(s) This place is situated on the easterly angle of the Middle Niger. 

 Voyages et Decouvertes dans VAfrique Septentriomle et Centrale — by Dr. H. 

 Barth, translated by P. Ithier, vol. IV, p. 10. 



(*) Barth, loc cit.,p. 5. 



