10 
TRAVELS m AFRICA. Chap. LXX. 
responds to the state of the river which I have just 
described. For he records* the surprising fact, which 
formerly must have been quite unintelligible, but 
which now receives its full illustration, namely, that the 
river at Iddd began to rise on the 22nd of March. This, 
in my opinion, he erroneously attributes to the rains 
up the country, as there are no rains whatever during 
the whole of March, and only a few drops in April ; but 
it is evidently the effect of the waters in the upper and 
wide part of the river at length beginning to decrease 
about the middle of February, if we take the current 
at from 2^ to 3 miles, as the windings of the river 
extend to not much less than 2000 miles between 
Kabara and Idda. The elevation of Timbuktu above 
the level of the sea I assume to be about 900 feet. 
It was on the 4th of January that the first boat 
from Kdbara approached close to the walls of the 
town of Timbuktu ; and, as the immediate result of 
such a greater facility of intercourse, the supply of 
corn became more plentiful, and, in consequence, much 
cheaper ; the saa of millet being sold for 40 shells, 
and the suniye, that is to say, more than two hundred 
pounds' weight, for 3000, or one Spanish dollar, cer- 
tainly a very low rate ; while I myself, as a foreigner 
and a stranger, had to pay 3750. The high state of 
* See Laird and Oldfield, vol. ii. p. 275. "It was a source of 
satisfaction to find that, owing to the rains up the country, the 
river began to rise about Saturday, March 22nd, since which time 
it had increased about two inches. A few drops of rain that fell 
this morning was all that we had at Iddah." 
