100 TRAVELS IN THE 
but is found in the greatest plenty on the sandy soil of Kaarta, 
Ludamar, and the northern parts of Bambarra, where it is one 
of the most common shrubs of the country. I had observed the 
same species at Gambia, and had an opportunity to make a 
drawing of a branch in flower, of which an engraving is given. 
The leaves of the desert shrub are, however, much smaller ; 
and more resembling, in that particular, those represented in 
the engraving given by Desfontaines, in the M6moires de TAca- 
d£mie Royale des Sciences, 1788, p. 443. 
As this shrub is found in Tunis, and also in the Negro king- 
doms, and as it furnishes the natives of the latter with a food 
resembling bread, and also with a sweet liquor, which is much 
relished by them, there can be little doubt of its being the lotus 
mentioned by Pliny, as the food of the Lybian Lotophagi. An 
army may very well have been fed with the bread I have tasted, 
made of the meal of the fruit, as is said by Pliny to have been 
done in Lybia ; and as the taste of the bread is sweet and 
agreeable, it is not likely that the soldiers would complain of it. 
We arrived in the evening at the village of Toorda ; when 
all the rest of the king's people turned back except two, who 
remained w ith me as guides to Jarra. 
Feb. 15th. I departed from Toorda, and about tw f o o'clock 
came to a considerable town called Funingkedy. As we ap- 
proached the town the inhabitants were much alarmed ; for, as 
one of my guides wore a turban, they mistook us for some 
Moorish banditti. This misapprehension was soon cleared up, 
and we were well received by a Gambia Slatee, who resides at 
this town, and at whose house we lodged. 
